August 18, 2008 (Monday)

A very kind ophthalmologist and family friend, Dr. L, opened up his office early in the morning so that Gracie could be evaluated. We assumed that he would be able to address the opaque eye issue and give us some advise like, "This happens occasionally. Just watch it for a couple more weeks and let your pediatrician know if it does not go away. It is really no big deal." or "It is really nothing, don't worry." Instead he told us that there was certainly something there and we should have it looked at by a pediatric ophthalmologist as he had never seen it before. (He did dilate her pupils but she was not under anesthesia.) He was not sure if it was serious or not. He mentioned that it could be cancer, the result of trauma, or something else that he did not know about. He told us to make an appointment as soon as we could with our pediatric ophthalmologist, Dr. O.
Later that night Dr. L called me and explained that he had put a call into the pediatric ophthalmologist that he knew and was waiting for a response. He said that the reason he called was to say that he had done some research and Gracie's symptoms were consistent with retinoblastoma (eye cancer). He did not want to be alarmist but wanted to make every effort to rule it out. He said that the next step was to get a CT scan as soon as possible. He would call us back with more details once the pediatric ophthalmologist got back to him.