C
Christina K
As I posted on the pre-op thread Dad came through his surgery on Jan. 10 amazingly well. He was only in the operating room for seven hours and in the process had the tricuspid valve and mitral valve repaired, and aortic valve replaced as his surgeon discovered much more damage to that than they had forecast. He had it replaced with bovine valve.
Dad only spent from Thursday night until Monday morning in ICU and that only because they couldn't get a bed up in stepdown. He took it upon himself to remove his OWN breathing tube (I know, not good) but was awake enough to watch football playoffs with me the Sunday after surgery.
I have to say his surgeon Dr. Gosta Pettersson is an amazing guy. He is a wonderfully calming and reassuring man who since the surgery has visited dad three times and has also taken time to have a meeting with me to explain further what he did. Ever since we got here we've heard amazing things about him and he is definitely one of the best respected surgeons in this field. Dad has done work with health professionals around the country in the past and they agreed...I also have learned Dr. Pettersson will likely do a lung transplant on my cousin in the future should she need it.
Dad has been in stepdown since Monday Jan. 14. Initially they wanted to release him last Saturday (Jan. 19) but something in me said that was too early and over the weekend he started developing incision pain. It turns out he has developed a staph infection in his sternal incision but a CAT scan showed it it not deep into the incision so they do not need to do any de-breeding (is that how its' spelled?) They are treating it with antibiotics and some sort of automatic pump that draws out fluid from the incision. Anybody heard of this type of infection/dealt with it before?
Other than this as his doctors say "all his numbers are good" and his heart's refraction rate is 50 percent. He is able to walk around, talk on phone easily, wash himself, etc. etc. and is being his classic "curmudgeon" self including insisting I fly back home to South Carolina even though I've tried to explain I would be more worried there than I am here now.
Any description about past dealing with similar infections and etc. would be appreciated. Overall, however, we really have received the best care imaginable here and the folks here at Cleveland Clinic have all been amazing, from the surgeon down to the folks who greet you at the door. If something ever happens to me, I've told all family...send me there!
Dad only spent from Thursday night until Monday morning in ICU and that only because they couldn't get a bed up in stepdown. He took it upon himself to remove his OWN breathing tube (I know, not good) but was awake enough to watch football playoffs with me the Sunday after surgery.
I have to say his surgeon Dr. Gosta Pettersson is an amazing guy. He is a wonderfully calming and reassuring man who since the surgery has visited dad three times and has also taken time to have a meeting with me to explain further what he did. Ever since we got here we've heard amazing things about him and he is definitely one of the best respected surgeons in this field. Dad has done work with health professionals around the country in the past and they agreed...I also have learned Dr. Pettersson will likely do a lung transplant on my cousin in the future should she need it.
Dad has been in stepdown since Monday Jan. 14. Initially they wanted to release him last Saturday (Jan. 19) but something in me said that was too early and over the weekend he started developing incision pain. It turns out he has developed a staph infection in his sternal incision but a CAT scan showed it it not deep into the incision so they do not need to do any de-breeding (is that how its' spelled?) They are treating it with antibiotics and some sort of automatic pump that draws out fluid from the incision. Anybody heard of this type of infection/dealt with it before?
Other than this as his doctors say "all his numbers are good" and his heart's refraction rate is 50 percent. He is able to walk around, talk on phone easily, wash himself, etc. etc. and is being his classic "curmudgeon" self including insisting I fly back home to South Carolina even though I've tried to explain I would be more worried there than I am here now.
Any description about past dealing with similar infections and etc. would be appreciated. Overall, however, we really have received the best care imaginable here and the folks here at Cleveland Clinic have all been amazing, from the surgeon down to the folks who greet you at the door. If something ever happens to me, I've told all family...send me there!
