shanwow1
Active member
TL;DR summary: Jan 23 bicuspid aortic valve replaced with On-x valve. Recovery was smooth until C. Difficile infection. Home after 7 days. Back in hospital 6 days after that with pericardial effusion. Drained effectively, home now, waiting for results of follow-up echo.
Surgery day -1: Checked in to the hospital at 6 pm on Thursday, January 22. Since I had received my surgery date from a cancellation list, I had not attended the normal pre-admission clinic. All the hospital staff were extremely confused by this. We waited until 8:30 pm to finally meet the surgeon’s assistant (resident?) and get some actual information. Had the pre-surgery shower with the scrub sponges, and slept from about 11-5.
Surgery day: The morning of surgery, Friday January 23, I was woken up to do another scrub and get into a gown. They came to get me with a gurney at about 7:30 am. I had to take a pill to stop acidity from building up in my stomach, but they wouldn’t let me take it with water, so it got stuck and I gagged; a rather unpleasant start. My family came with me down to the surgical suite waiting area, where I met the anesthesiologist. I had a little freakout/cry, then they wheeled me into the actual surgery room. At this point I still had not met my surgeon. I thought it was pretty insane that they just wheeled me right in there with no sedative or anything. I remember it was very cold and there were a lot of people around doing things. The surgeon came over to reassure me that everything would be great, and confirmed that he would put in the On-x valve. Then while putting IV’s in people started asking me what I do for work, which I knew was just a distraction. I remember saying that I suddenly felt sleepy and that was it. I am told that the surgery took 3 hours, and went exactly as planned. The surgeon told my family that he tried to repair my valve, which had not been previously discussed, but that it couldn’t be done.
Upon waking up one of my nightmares came true – I was aware that I was still hooked up to the ventilator. My wife was holding one hand and my mom was holding the other, and they were trying to tell me to relax, but I was too groggy and panicked so I couldn’t help fighting it. They were able to take it out shortly after I woke up, which was also pretty awful. I can distinctly remember the slimy tube coming out, super unpleasant. Then I threw up, which was painful. Mercifully after that I was able to descend into a narcotic filled sleep. Once the night came I was awoken by extreme pain in my left shoulder, which they determined was being caused by one of my chest tubes. As other people on here have stated, those chest tubes really cause a lot of discomfort. I had a really nice nurse that sat me up for the first time and rubbed my back that first night in the ICU to help me feel a bit better.
Post Surgery Day 1: The order of happenings get a little fuzzy from here, due to the aforementioned narcotics. I mainly remember being given a combination of Oxycodone and Dilaudid. But when they gave me a full 10 mg of Dilaudid I would wake up gasping for air, as it apparently made me forget to breathe? I believe my catheter may have been removed at some point on this day. I think they also tried to get me to eat, but I didn’t have much of an appetite.
Post Surgery Day 2: I had my chest tubes removed. Took about an hour for the discomfort to go away, but then I felt so much better. The most uncomfortable thing was getting in and out of bed. But I was also having runs of PVC’s and PAC’s, which made it hard to sleep. They started IV Magnesium, which seemed to help even things out.
Post Surgery Day 3: I took 2 walks to the actual washroom (as opposed to the bedside commode I had previously been using). Then I was moved from the ICU to the post-surgical recovery ward. They reduced my Dilaudid dose to 5 mg, which helped the breathing issues, but I still had crazy dreams.
Post Surgery Day 4: This was the day the diarrhea started… My recovery had been going very smoothly, even better than expected up until this point. At first they thought it was just a side effect of the stool softeners and laxatives. By the evening they decided to take a stool sample.
Post Surgery Day 5: The test for Clostridium Difficile (C. Diff) came back positive. I was moved to a private room for isolation around 4 pm. I was hoping they still might let me go home the following day as I was feeling very strong. They started me on IV antibiotics (Flagyl) that night.
Post Surgery Day 6: Was informed they were going to keep me another night so that they could continue to administer the Flagyl by IV and ensure that I was not dehydrated from the symptoms of the infection. I was really frustrated by this as I was extremely bored, disgusted by the hospital food and feeling very strong overall. My incision bandage was taken off as it was healing extremely well. A nurse said I was healing like Wolverine and that she had never seen an incision look so good so quickly. Yay me.
Post Surgery Day 7: FREEDOM. I was finally allowed to go home, but had to wait a frustrating 2 hours for the nurse to be available to actually discharge me. Felt great to be home, but even the short journey to get there was exhausting.
So I got home on the Friday, one week after my surgery. The following Wednesday night I started feeling palpitations. My heart rate had been around 100 for a few days, and then it would suddenly drop beats and make me feel short of breath and weak. I called the ward and they said if it got worse to go the ER. It wasn’t too bad so I went to bed. When I got up in the morning I started experiencing long runs of these palpitations/irregular heart rate. I called my surgeon’s office, and he happened to be there. He told me to go to the ER just to get things checked out. So we did, and eventually they discovered that I had fluid around my heart (pericardial effusion). The next morning (Friday), I had a one hour surgery to put in a chest tube to drain the fluid. Mercifully, this time they took out the ventilator before I woke up. I stayed in the hospital until Monday with the tube in, but they were satisfied that it had finished draining, so they took it out and I got to go home again. Yesterday I had a follow-up echo to find out if the fluid is back or not. They let me go home and I haven’t received the results yet, which I’m taking as a good sign. But I have had some palpitations over the last few days.
Oh yeah and I managed not to sneeze for a little over 3 weeks! So when I finally did it barely hurt at all
Surgery day -1: Checked in to the hospital at 6 pm on Thursday, January 22. Since I had received my surgery date from a cancellation list, I had not attended the normal pre-admission clinic. All the hospital staff were extremely confused by this. We waited until 8:30 pm to finally meet the surgeon’s assistant (resident?) and get some actual information. Had the pre-surgery shower with the scrub sponges, and slept from about 11-5.
Surgery day: The morning of surgery, Friday January 23, I was woken up to do another scrub and get into a gown. They came to get me with a gurney at about 7:30 am. I had to take a pill to stop acidity from building up in my stomach, but they wouldn’t let me take it with water, so it got stuck and I gagged; a rather unpleasant start. My family came with me down to the surgical suite waiting area, where I met the anesthesiologist. I had a little freakout/cry, then they wheeled me into the actual surgery room. At this point I still had not met my surgeon. I thought it was pretty insane that they just wheeled me right in there with no sedative or anything. I remember it was very cold and there were a lot of people around doing things. The surgeon came over to reassure me that everything would be great, and confirmed that he would put in the On-x valve. Then while putting IV’s in people started asking me what I do for work, which I knew was just a distraction. I remember saying that I suddenly felt sleepy and that was it. I am told that the surgery took 3 hours, and went exactly as planned. The surgeon told my family that he tried to repair my valve, which had not been previously discussed, but that it couldn’t be done.
Upon waking up one of my nightmares came true – I was aware that I was still hooked up to the ventilator. My wife was holding one hand and my mom was holding the other, and they were trying to tell me to relax, but I was too groggy and panicked so I couldn’t help fighting it. They were able to take it out shortly after I woke up, which was also pretty awful. I can distinctly remember the slimy tube coming out, super unpleasant. Then I threw up, which was painful. Mercifully after that I was able to descend into a narcotic filled sleep. Once the night came I was awoken by extreme pain in my left shoulder, which they determined was being caused by one of my chest tubes. As other people on here have stated, those chest tubes really cause a lot of discomfort. I had a really nice nurse that sat me up for the first time and rubbed my back that first night in the ICU to help me feel a bit better.
Post Surgery Day 1: The order of happenings get a little fuzzy from here, due to the aforementioned narcotics. I mainly remember being given a combination of Oxycodone and Dilaudid. But when they gave me a full 10 mg of Dilaudid I would wake up gasping for air, as it apparently made me forget to breathe? I believe my catheter may have been removed at some point on this day. I think they also tried to get me to eat, but I didn’t have much of an appetite.
Post Surgery Day 2: I had my chest tubes removed. Took about an hour for the discomfort to go away, but then I felt so much better. The most uncomfortable thing was getting in and out of bed. But I was also having runs of PVC’s and PAC’s, which made it hard to sleep. They started IV Magnesium, which seemed to help even things out.
Post Surgery Day 3: I took 2 walks to the actual washroom (as opposed to the bedside commode I had previously been using). Then I was moved from the ICU to the post-surgical recovery ward. They reduced my Dilaudid dose to 5 mg, which helped the breathing issues, but I still had crazy dreams.
Post Surgery Day 4: This was the day the diarrhea started… My recovery had been going very smoothly, even better than expected up until this point. At first they thought it was just a side effect of the stool softeners and laxatives. By the evening they decided to take a stool sample.
Post Surgery Day 5: The test for Clostridium Difficile (C. Diff) came back positive. I was moved to a private room for isolation around 4 pm. I was hoping they still might let me go home the following day as I was feeling very strong. They started me on IV antibiotics (Flagyl) that night.
Post Surgery Day 6: Was informed they were going to keep me another night so that they could continue to administer the Flagyl by IV and ensure that I was not dehydrated from the symptoms of the infection. I was really frustrated by this as I was extremely bored, disgusted by the hospital food and feeling very strong overall. My incision bandage was taken off as it was healing extremely well. A nurse said I was healing like Wolverine and that she had never seen an incision look so good so quickly. Yay me.
Post Surgery Day 7: FREEDOM. I was finally allowed to go home, but had to wait a frustrating 2 hours for the nurse to be available to actually discharge me. Felt great to be home, but even the short journey to get there was exhausting.
So I got home on the Friday, one week after my surgery. The following Wednesday night I started feeling palpitations. My heart rate had been around 100 for a few days, and then it would suddenly drop beats and make me feel short of breath and weak. I called the ward and they said if it got worse to go the ER. It wasn’t too bad so I went to bed. When I got up in the morning I started experiencing long runs of these palpitations/irregular heart rate. I called my surgeon’s office, and he happened to be there. He told me to go to the ER just to get things checked out. So we did, and eventually they discovered that I had fluid around my heart (pericardial effusion). The next morning (Friday), I had a one hour surgery to put in a chest tube to drain the fluid. Mercifully, this time they took out the ventilator before I woke up. I stayed in the hospital until Monday with the tube in, but they were satisfied that it had finished draining, so they took it out and I got to go home again. Yesterday I had a follow-up echo to find out if the fluid is back or not. They let me go home and I haven’t received the results yet, which I’m taking as a good sign. But I have had some palpitations over the last few days.
Oh yeah and I managed not to sneeze for a little over 3 weeks! So when I finally did it barely hurt at all
