She's Looking Awesome!

Happy end of summer/beginning of fall!

It's only been 3 months since our last check in, but per usual, Savanna has had some adventures to tell you about before we get into her (awesome) Shriners visit!

Recent Adventures:

Camping with friends

Visit to Cleveland

First day of school

Baking a cake with a friend

First day of new dance class!

Visit to Shriners:

This visit was pretty great!  Just as we thought/hoped from the last visit in June (discussed here), Savanna had been standing a bit funny during the last x-ray, which caused her curve to look like it was about 19 degrees.  

However, this x-ray taken yesterday (September 14), looked so good that the physician assistant did not even measure the curve.  She said, "I did not even measure the curve.  If anything, it would maybe be about 6 degrees, max!"  How cool is that?  We have been so fortunate that Savanna has held steady for this long.  She has now been out of her brace full time since early February 2022, about 7 months.

She still has the spondylolisthesis, as seen in the x-ray below, but Dr. Pete is still not that worried.  He said that we will continue to monitor it and take lateral x-rays each time she has x-rays.  However, in most cases, the spondylolisthesis does not worsen for people, so it likely will not for Savanna either.

Therefore, we will continue on as we have been, and we will see Dr. Pete again in 6 months!  It turns out that the reason we went back in 3 months this time was because Dr. Pete wanted to do another x-ray sooner than 6 months, just because of the poor x-ray last time.  However, at least for the near future, we will likely stay on a 6-month check up schedule, unless anything concerning pops up along the way.  I do worry a little about her curve possibly returning during the rapid growth phase of adolescence, as I have seen it happen in other scoli kids we know.  I asked Dr. Pete about this, and he said that maybe 10-15% of his "infantile scoliosis" kids have a curve return in adolescence, and because of their history, he may want to put them back in a brace.  However, he also said that adolescent scoliosis is not necessarily related to infantile scoliosis.  

So, I will try to stop borrowing trouble with those worries, and I will instead focus on the AWESOME x-ray from this visit!  6 degrees!  Woot woot!!

That's all for now!  Thanks for reading, and I will post again after her next check up in March 2023.