Implant surgery March 8--Part 2

[gerryp]

Post-surgery in NYC: Dr. Eid emphasizes lying flat on your back for the first 48 hours to minimize swelling, but also recommends walking for 15 minutes 3 times/day. I found that lying down was my most comfortable position, but it’s also pretty damned boring to be lying flat staring at a hotel room ceiling! Figuring out how to get in and out of bed was interesting, because you need to avoid mashing your testicles in any way. The amount and type of pain medication you need varies with the individual. Some guys mention just using ¼ the recommended dose of Percocet or Tylenol III. For me, this surgery resulted in more pain than I really expected and by trial and error I learned how to deal with it. The doctor’s instructions mentioned that patients can return to work at their discretion, usually after 1 to 2 weeks. At this writing (7 days), there’s no way I would be ready to go back to work!

During this period (during the weekend), I came to appreciate Dr. Eid’s instructions to call his cell phone with any problems. I went back to the hotel with a Foley catheter installed, and very detailed instructions on how to remove it no sooner than Monday morning. By Saturday afternoon, I began noticing some blood in the catheter bag. As it wasn’t going away, I called the doc and discussed it. We had 2 or 3 phone calls about it the next 24 hours, with him finally instructing me to come to his office at 8:00 am Monday on the way to the airport. My wife and I were very nervous that he was going to send me to the hospital rather than home, but fortunately things were looking better by then and we were able to head home. He removed the catheter (better he than I!), then examined the inside of my bladder via cystoscope (again) to determine there were no serious issues. Apparently thinking my partial erection wasn’t enough, he then gave it a couple more pumps (ouch!).

While at his office I asked if he would send me a copy of the OR Notes (or operative record). Don’t know if it’s normal to do so or not, but he jumped right on it and made sure it was ready for me before we left the office. It’s a very useful record, and I recommend asking for it if not automatically given.

Trip Home: Uneventful, but a bit painful. As mentioned in Part 1, I brought with me a doughnut cushion to sit on. By now, my scrotum was very swollen, so finding a comfortable position was not easy. Dr. Eid emphasized not to sit on your scrotum during the first 7 days, as scar tissue is forming around the pump. He places it in a pouch, normally low in the scrotum, and sitting on it tends to push the pump upward. He says this would cause the pump to be permanently in a harder to reach position. The cushion I bought is available both on Amazon and at local medical supply stores. (How do I know?—well, the one I bought from Amazon, I left sitting in my aircraft seat when we deplaned, so immediately determined the same thing’s available locally!)

One final thing about traveling: if you're doing this, ask for a wheelchair. You can pick it up when you check in at the ticket counter and they'll navigate you through security all the way to the gate. Highly recommended!

Next: recovering at home.

[gerryp]

Hi Guys,

So I received a PM yesterday from Woodworker57, whose surgery was the same day as mine (March 8). His recovery seems to be pretty much on a normal path, but since I had not posted recently he wanted to know if everything was ok here. I had been meaning to give you guys one final update, but actually hadn't felt much like sitting in front of the computer for very long. I had been continuing to deal with the bleeding, but also had quite a bit of pain and was still on narcotic pain meds until 3 days ago.

Except for the bleeding I mentioned, recovery has been moving along normally. But the bleeding has definitely been an issue. Dr. Eid said I think that it was a case of arterial bleeding and the last time he had seen it was about 10 years ago. Since that represents maybe 3000+ cases, that makes me really special! Anyway, I didn't have to make another trip to New York or anything, just had to constantly maintain clean gauze in the wound area. It had pretty much run the course by Wed. am, but on Friday I had my stitches removed locally. That seemed to irritate the site and bleeding restarted. I decided to treat it more aggressively if need be, and bought some wound seal powder from Walgreen's. Used it this morning after my shower and it did an amazing job. Not one single drop of blood all day! Pain is a lot better, too.

Have one last appointment in NYC for activation on April 16.

Best wishes to all my bionic brothers on FrankTalk!!

Gerry