What to Expect the Day of Your WLS Surgery

What to Expect the Day of Your WLS Surgery

 

 

I'm not sure if you're asking a question or making an announcement, but here's a list I posted some time ago about what to expect on surgery day:

 

• Once you go into the hospital, head to the admittance office and complete whatever paperwork they require. Bring ID, insurance info, a list of your current medications, and any other papers they will have required in advance.

• Go to the surgical unit waiting room.

• Wait there until a nurse calls your name.

• The nurse will take you to a curtained-off cubicle, which will have a gurney, a chair and a plastic bag for your clothes.

• She or he will direct you to change into a hospital gown, put a fabric shower cap over your hair, and put on those ever-so-stylish hospital pressure socks (Their purpose is to help prevent blood clots in your legs from extended immobility.) The nurse will leave while you change. When you're dressed in your stunning new outfit, open the curtain, and wait for the nurse to come back.

• The nurse will settle you onto the gurney in a semi-reclining position if you're not already there.

• Wait around some more.

• Another nurse will come in and take some blood draws from your arm. An IV needle will be inserted (usually in your hand or arm) and fluids from the bag hanging on the IV pole next to your bed will be started to keep you hydrated. An oxygen monitor clip will be placed onto your finger. An atutomatic blood pressure cuff will be wrapped around your arm. All of these instruments will be attached to a machine that continuously measures your blood pressure, oxygen levels, and heart rate. It beeps a lot. Don't be alarmed. That machine just loves to beep.

• At this point, if someone came with you to the hospital, he or she will be allowed to come in to keep you company.

• Wait around some more.

• More forms will be brought in for you to sign (liability releases -- just what you want to think about right before surgery).

• Wait around some more.

• At some point, your anesthesiologist will visit you for a few minutes to tell you what he'll be using to keep you comfortable before, during, and after surgery.

• When your surgeon is ready for you, they'll move you fast.

• Your gurney will be wheeled out of the cubicle, down various corridors, and finally into the OR. It's very bright and cold in there. Ask for blankets if you're cold.

• There will be lots of hustle and bustle around you as the team preps the instruments.

• A little something relaxing will be injected into your IV. It's very soothing. Mmmmmmm.

• Your surgeon will come in masked and gowned. He'll make sure you're you and say a few encouraging words.

• An anesthesia mask will be placed over your face. You'll be told to breathe deeply. A few breaths later, you'll be out cold.

• While under anesthesia, the surgical team will intubate you; that is, insert a narrow tube down your throat and into your trachea. This is a precautionary step to keep your airway open during surgery. If your surgeon wants a urinary catheter inserted, they'll do that too. I don't remember anything being said about a catheter in my case. If they used one, it was removed before I regained consciousness. Don't worry that you'll be too heavy for them to do this. They've done it a hundred times before.

• You will wake up in the recovery room. You'll be very woozy. Your first coherent thought will be "I'm alive!" Then, "I did it! I'm sleeved!" These are very reassuring thoughts!

• At some point while still you're still woozy, the nurses will remove the intubation tube. It'll feel a little weird but it won't hurt. Sometimes it's removed before you wake up. Your throat will feel very sore. It will take a few days until the soreness goes away.

• You will have a drainage tube dangling from one of the small incisions in your abdomen. It shouldn't hurt, but it's kind of gross looking.

• Nurses will keep coming to you and asking in unnecessarily loud voices how you feel. Tell them if you feel nauseated or are in pain (you probably won't be; you'll still be flying high from the anesthesia). But if you are in any distress, the nurses can inject meds into your IV to help you feel better.

• When you're recovered enough to know what's going on around you and can be raised to a sitting position, they'll wheel you to your hospital room, where you'll rest for a little while. You'll still be hooked up to that beeping machine. It lives to beep. You will just have to endure it till the nurse comes in and fixes whatever is making it beep -- empty IV bags, gremlins, whatever. There will be a call button attached to your bed rail to call the nurses if you need them. Rest for a while and contemplate the future. You probably won't feel like reading, watching TV, or playing with your laptop. You'll still be a bit too woozy do much of anything. Over the next few hours, your alertness will increase and you'll feel pretty much yourself again.

• About four hours or so after your surgery, nurses will come in and help you to your feet and guide you to the bathroom for your first walk and a very welcome bathroom break.

• When you're back in bed, you'll probably sleep for a while.

• You may have one of those push-button painkiller med dispensers. Use it if necessary. You'll feel stiff, and your incision sites will feel sore. You may have pain, especially in your shoulders, from the gas they used in the OR to inflate your abdomen. Sitting up and walking frequently helps dispel this gas.

• Nurses will come in at regular intervals to inject you with blood thinners and painkillers, check your IV, replace empty IV bags with full ones, and do other sundry chores.

• Once you're fully awake, you can start to take charge of your own recovery. This is where the "walk, walk, walk" advice kicks in. Get up and walk around slowly and carefully every half-hour to an hour. You'll be glad you have your PJ bottoms on. You'll have to roll your IV pole along with you. Your sleep that night will be broken up by nurses taking your vital signs and administering medications. Use those breaks to take short walks before going back to sleep.

• This next step was not done by my surgeon, but is commonly done the following morning. You'll be wheelchaired to a room where the surgeon or another doctor will give you a tiny amount of barium solution to drink while observing your new stomach on a fluoroscope to determine if there are any leaks along your incision line. Usually, the line holds just fine.

• Back in your room, you'll be given two ounces of water to drink. It will take you a long, long time to get it down. Take heart. Your ability to drink liquids will increase quickly over the next day or two as your stomach swelling starts to diminish. This is when the "sip, sip, sip" advice kicks in.

• At some point during the day after the surgery, your surgeon will examine you and ask questions about how you're feeling. He'll then determine whether you can go home that day or need to stay one more night. Nearly everyone can go home the day after surgery.

• If you're to be discharged that day, the nurses will remove the drainage tube (sometimes you have to go home with it. You'll be instructed how to take care of it). If they remove the tube in the hospital, it will feel very strange but shouldn't hurt. They'll start unhooking you from the infernal beeping machine, and the IV will be removed from your arm.

• You'll get dressed in your own comfortable clothes and wait for the nurses to give you more forms to sign. They'll also go over a list of discharge instructions, which you will take home with you. These instructions tell you what you can and can't do in the first few weeks following surgery and when to call your surgeon should any complications crop up.

• Wait around some more.

• The nurses will put you in a wheelchair (don't bother telling them you can walk out; the hospital's liability insurance demands that you be wheeled out). They'll wheel you out to the entrance where your designated driver will pick you up and take you home. Use that pillow you remembered to put in the car to hold against your stomach to cushion it from bumps in the road.

• When you get home, do a little victory dance in your head, go to bed, and take a nice, well-deserved, beepless nap. Then get busy recovering.

 

 

Lol I just told my husband today that I never made it past the door where I was prepped.  I was gone after I said goodbye to him.  Never saw the OR at all!

Great information. I am not sure why the hyper-link didn't show. Again, thanks!

Sorry, Kathy! I didn't realize your post was a link to an article.

Doh! I forgot all about those pressure boots. 

 

psychoticparrot