SURGERY UPDATES

First, many thanks to all the amazing people who care so much about Matthew and are eager to hear how he is doing, as well as for all the love, thoughts, and prayer throughout this process.

I will update THIS POST throughout the day as we have updates from the OR. Please check back here for the latest on Matthew's progress. All times below are Eastern.

2:43 - Incision has been made. Surgery is underway.

4:15 - Matthew is now on heart/lung bypass. 

6:00 - No significant update. Matthew still on bypass. Surgery is progressing well. 

6:45 - During the bypass process, they cool patients down to slow the cellular metabolic rate down. The liaison nurse just told us that the operation is essentially complete, and they have just started warming him up to take him off of bypass. We have not heard from surgery for a full report of the operation yet. 

7:23 - Officially off of bypass. It will be another 45 min to 1 hour before we see him or hear any more. 

8:20 - Matthew is back in the CICU (Cardiac Intensive Care Unit). Still haven't seen him or the surgeon. 

10:20 - Will and Nikki are with Matthew now. Dr. Baird said that everything looks really good. They put a graft into his left pulmonary artery (PA) to expand it. For those of you who missed the earlier post - during the heart cath last week they said Matthews left PA (supplies blood from the heart to the left lung) was "tortuous" or in lay terms... had some obstruction. Dr. Baird said they will watch the PA to see if it needs any more attention in the future, however, any intervention could be done in the cath lab. Just got one more quick update from Mimi, who just saw Matthew and announced that he looks "beautiful." :)

So many thanks to those of you who have remembered Matthew and family today in thought, prayer, or an uplifting word.  Our gratitude is hard to measure.