Waiting...

I called Dr. Parrish on Tuesday and found out that they normally confer with UCSF on Tuesdays (not Fridays, like I thought). They were scheduled to discuss our case that day, but the surgeons were called out (probably to do some lifesaving surgery) before they got to us. They have Drew on the schedule for next Tuesday. So we have more waiting. We decided to cancel Drew's appointment for Thursday because he doesn't need to be seen, really the doctor wants to talk with us about the surgical plan. We decided we would talk on the phone after Tuesday's conference. The big question will be, do we want to get a second and possibly third opinion? Dr. Parrish says we need to say to him "we want a second opinion" because it is not his place to suggest one, although since we have been discussing it he told us he thinks its a good idea. As he said, "if I were going to have them cut open my chest, for the third time, I'd want to be sure I had more than one guy's opinion on it." Which is where this interesting story comes in...

After we got home from the hospital last weekend, Dan says to me "Oh I forgot to tell you what my dad told me while we were at the hospital."
"Oh, what's that?" I say.
"I guess someone he works with at the Gallery, her father is a pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon at Stanford."
"What?!" I gasp. "Are you serious?"
"Yeah, his name is...Dr. Hanley?" he says as though he has no idea who that is. "She said he would be willing to talk with us if we are interested. I have his email and phone number."

OK, so I guess my husband doesn't follow the heart blogs much, but still, he has no idea who THE DR. HANLEY is? He is like the man of pediatric heart surgery. He is a world renown heart surgeon. He was formerly the chair of pediatric cardiothoracic surgery at UCSF before he left to help Stanford begin their program. He pioneered the unifocalization surgery. And apparently, his daughter works with my father-in-law. Is that insane or what?! So we put in a call to him and are waiting for a call back. That makes the second opinion decision a little bit easier I think.