Helmet Head

Hello Again!  It’s been maybe the craziest few months ever with ups and some major downs.  Most pressing right now though is that we’re moving!  And I have only a couple more days with my computer so I thought I’d catch up a little on the blog.

I want to start with Evan’s helmet.  It’s been a really interesting experience and not near as bad as I expected.  Mostly because Evan loves that thing!  He paws at his head when it’s off.

At Evan’s 6 month appointment we were referred to a pediatric plastic surgeon about his head shape.  I took Evan up to Primary Children’s in Salt Lake to see them and it was determined with the plastic surgeon that his mishapen head was severe enough that we’d be referred to Fit-Well Prosthetics and Orthotics.  At Fit-Well, they took measurements and pictures to send to our insurance company.  They have this policy that they pre-approve all helmet patients so parents know how much to expect to pay and can decide from there if they’re willing to keep going with the helmet.  I learned that they have a scale of 1-10 for headmishapen-ness.  1-3, they don’t do anything usually, 3-4 parent’s can do helmet therapy, but insurance usually won’t cover it, 5+ and they recommend helmet therapy and if your insurance covers helmet therapy at all, they’ll approve your claim.  Evan came out at a 5.5.  Thankfully, our insurance covered it, yay!  Which meant this helmet set us back $240 instead of $1700.

We took him in to get a cast of his head

The poor baby had a fever of 102 on the day of our appointment!  He was so lethargic and miserable!  This picture just makes me want to cuddle and coo to him.  That poor, poor baby!  They take a cast because helmets are made to fit precisely to their head, then they let out the helmet in areas they want his head to grow in to.

Evan got the helmet the day before Thanksgiving.  That day and the next 3 appointments were really fun and interesting because it was the first time ever that a blow torch was a large part of a doctor’s appointment!  They heat up the helmet and let it out that way.  It’s extremely heat sensitive, but can handle any other type of abuse!

Here’s our Squeaker in his helmet!  It’s nice and thin and clear.  Not those outrageously awful thick white ones so that’s awesome!

It’s been 10 weeks and we were supposed to go back to the plastic surgeon today to see if Evan’s done, but the Doctor is on vacation!  Whenever he gets the helmet off, I think Evan will have a bruised head for awhile because he’s become very brave in that thing!  I’m excited for him to be done just because I miss kissing him on the head whenever I want!