Kemper was born on March 23rd, 2017 with Tricuspid Atresia. When she was born we had no idea anything was wrong until a few hours later the nurses were doing their vital checks on her and noticed a heart murmur. We had initially thought it was a pretty minor murmur and hoped it would be something that would just go away on its own. The following morning the pediatrician listened to her and decided to do an echo cardiogram to check on things. About an hour later he came back to tell us she had the Tricuspid Atresia, which means the right side of her heart didn't develop properly. There are different variations of the condition and with hers she also has 2 holes in her heart. The pediatrician told us they were going to transfer her down to Iowa City Children's Hospital right away. Right away turned into hours as we had to wait for an ambulance to come from Iowa City to Mason City and then head back down to Iowa City. After arriving in Iowa City Kemper had another echo done by their cardiologists and then we met with the surgeon and cardiologists to go over a plan. Here is a pretty good explanation of what Tricuspid Atresia is:
https://www.cincinnatichildrens.org/health/t/tricuspid The current plan is to monitor her until about 4-6 months old and then do a surgery and then around 2-4 years old she will have another surgery done. Hopefully after those two she will be fine. She will most likely have to be monitored for quite awhile but hoping those are the only two major surgeries.
