Alison had a couple of routine urology appointments today, an abdominal ultrasound and a cystometrogram (CMG). Since we were really early for our appointment, I had gone ahead and taken her to the bathroom, only to come back and find they were already ready for us. Her ultrasound showed that her kidneys and bladder look fine and we were able to see that her bladder was empty. So now we know that she does completely empty when she goes to the bathroom. That's good news...less risk of UTIs that way.

After lunch was the CMG (which checks the capacity, sensation, pressure and uninhibited contractions of the bladder). Because she's not cathed, I was a little worried about this test because they do have to insert a catheter. She was a real trooper, though, and barely even flinched when it was being inserted. Thank goodness for Blue's Clues! Her bladder pressures remained low for the whole test, which is good, and she had a normal bladder capacity for a 3 year old, which is also good.

Because she's potty trained now and because her test results have remained consistent over the last 3 years, we're at a point where we could consider not having any more regular urology appointments. However, because urological changes can be a first symptom of spinal cord tethering, and because tethering could become an issue as Alison grows, we all agreed to have the tests repeated again in two years.