Hello all – I thought I would post an update to my surgery. First a refresher…

Went in Monday 6/22/09 to Duke Univ. Hospital for a L5/S1 fusion. The n-surg did two 2.5 inch cuts in my back and did a minimally invasive fusion. He cut off 1 facet and ground it up to use as an autograft. It was put in a cage and put in where the L5/S1 disc had been. He then secured it with rods and screws. They used glue, no stitches.

The first few days were HELL! It would have been a lot better if I had some nurses to help in the hospital but I got no help and no pain relief (see other posts for details on how that got screwed up).

I spent just 1 night in the hospital and welcomed coming home so that I could get my pain under control and get some help.
Once home, I went to see my primary care doctor to get a good routine for pain meds. I am on Oxycontin 30 mg, twice per day for long term pain control. I have Percocet (10 mg) for breakthrough pain and Tramadol as well. Yesterday, I made it through with just the Oxycontin and tramodal without needing any extra Percocets.
I also had arm pain (near my bicep) – a big red splotch, very sore when I moved my arm, and kind of hard. I went to the doctor who sent me to the hospital for a sonogram. They found superficial blood clot and inflamed vein. I was given antibiotics for infection, told to take 600 mg. of Motrin 3X per day (even though normally I would not be allowed to because of the fusion), and told to put heat on it. It is somewhat better today.
The one week mark came with a definite improvement in overall pain. My incisions look great and I am moving more easily. My back is sore but overall – I feel so much improved. I still can’t tell if the surgery was successful at reducing my pre-surgery pain for severe Degenerative Disc Disease or not.
I am walking every day. Yesterday was my first walk of any significant length, I went about 1/2 + mile. Today, I am going to the gym and trying the treadmill so that I can see how much I can tolerate. My legs are sore but I have a massage chair at home that will massage my legs and that has been very helpful to get the blood flowing better through my legs.

It did take me 7 days before I had my first BM post surgery and it was very difficult. I feel like I didn’t have any muscle strength in that area. I am still a far way away from being back to normal in that area but I am happy that at least I started feeling the need to go again!
If you have any comments or questions, I would love to hear them!

You can view my video diary on YouTube at:

Early Monday morning, we left for Duke Hospital.  I was brought into the preop area where I met with a variety of doctors.  They did an IV.  This time I asked for no Lidocane as the Lidcane was worse than the IV last time.  It stung a little bit but not too bad.  Then it was just time to wait.  Of course, lying in bed like that was painful and I was anxious.  Dr. Isaacs came by and wrote on my back to mark out the surgical areas.

Finally, they put the mask on and I was out in about 2 seconds, maybe less.  They went to Joe to report on status periodically during the time.  I think the surgical time was about 2 hours although I was back there about 4 hours between getting ready and an hour to get me awake.

I don’t remember much waking up.  I know I was crying out in pain and asking for drugs and then falling back to sleep within seconds.

The first thing I remember was being in my room.  I could not stay in one position for very long (and lying on my back was not even an option) so Joe kept helping me to slide from side to side by pulling on a medical pad that was underneath me.

The evening nurse was great and so very helpful but she had to leave at 7 pm and Joe left slightly before that to go home and take care of the kids.  From then on, I was on my own!  The next 2 nurse shifts I got were useless.  They didn’t help me or check in on my.  I told one that I was going to throw up so she is puttering around looking for a bedpan and I said, “I am going to throw up NOW.”  She pushed the waste bucket towards me and I vomited a lot.  The nurse decided it was from the pain meds, so she decided not to give me any more oral meds and just give me my “breakthrough” morphine that was order.    Of course that was not enough to touch pain.  I also had so much IV fluid that I had to get up and use the bathroom every 1.5 hours – nurses were too busy to help!  It was horrible, getting in and out of bed.  I couldn’t stay in one position for long, so I was trying to roll over from one side to another or switched out with the car -  which is too hard to use as a single person who just had back surgery.  The bed was an airmattress and constantly deflating so I had no support for turning or getting in and out of the bed and all this with very little pain meds to control my pain.

The next morning, the new nurse was even worse.  She had a attitude that she knew what was best for me despite what the doctors or what I said.  They made me keep track of the frequency of the pain meds, so I would have to ask for them every 2-3 hours and then she would give me attitude about taking so much even though my doctor told me to stay ahead of the pain.  Someone screwed up my breakfast and I didn’t get any food until 9:15 am.  I asked for some crackers and got “the last one” with the read between the lines – and we won’t go find anymore.

I really could go on and on about the nurse care I received, it was really bad.  My whole situation could have been so much easier to deal with if I had someone compassionate and helpful like I did until 7 pm.  I had to ask the to empty the toilet measuring device so that I could pee the next time without it overflowing (it was clear that I was peeing just fine – but they refused to take it out) and I would get attitude that they were annoyed with me for asking for the few things that I had to ask for – even though I should have gotten help with so many other things.

I started to push for discharge as soon as I awoke the next morning since I knew that I needed to be on a healthy regime in order to get better with consistent pain control and help for getting up and down before I ended up falling and hurting myself.  The surgeon came in to talk with me and was also appalled at the lack of care and he said that I just needed to get an xray and then I could go home.  They brought me down for xray but then said they didn’t have discharge papers.  The intern wrote up discharge papers and of course he wrote for a different set of drugs than what my surgeon had told me to take.  I was just happy to get out of there though.

Getting in the car was quite painful.  The ride was okay until about the last 10 minutes or so.  I went to sleep once we got home and took pain pills on a schedule, used a lot of ice.  Moving was still very difficult but I had some periods when I wouldn’t move and was more comfortable.  More to come as I feel better and can write more.