A nurse just called to tell me that Luke is doing well and that they have just accessed his heart with the catheter. They haven't gotten to the point that they've taken any photos or injected any dyes yet or anything. This morning before they got started, the fellow reminded me that they'd be using the cath to measure the blood pressure, amount of flow across the holes, the size of the holes and other measurements inside of his heart. He also told me that because we know that Luke's heart has a mild imbalance in that the left ventricle is known to be a bit smaller than the right, if they can get the catheter across the top hole (the atrial septal defect) into the left ventricle (apparently they typically would do all of the measurements while working in the right side of the heart) that they will attempt to measure the pressure in the pulmonary artery as well likely injecting a dye into the left ventricle to better measure the true imbalance. We also found out that they didn't have to intubate him, rather he has been placed on a less invasive ventilator called a supra glottic ventilator aka an LMA device which is placed above the vocal chords. I am so relieved that he didn't have to be intubated.
She will call back in another hour with an update. She wasn't sure if they'd only need another hour or if it would be two more. We will know when she calls next time.
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