Surgery News!

FINALLY...

The date is set...

November 15th

         will be the day I have the double Nephrectomy and get my hernia repaired.

I met with the surgeon this morning at the IMC (Intermountain Medical Center) Campus.
To start I did extensive paperwork (Hx, Rx's, etc), followed by the surgeon coming in and going into detail about the surgery itself, and answering questions.

I have to go in to the hospital a few days prior to the surgery to have labs drawn. The surgeons need to check K+ levels (potassium), antigen count, CBC, etc. The testing will be extensive. IF my K+ is too high, the surgery will be delayed as excessive K+ can cause major cardiac events during a surgery--a VERY bad thing! Being on dialysis, my K+ levels are good on a consistent basis, so this shouldn't hold up the surgery.

Another factor that might potentially delay the surgery is if the surgeons have a transplant come up that morning. If that's the case, we'll just reschedule. I certainly won't begrudge another patient getting a transplant!

As far as dialysis; I'll do my regularly scheduled Tx's on Tuesday (12th) and Thursday (14th), followed by the surgery on the 15th, then do an in-hospital dialysis on the 16th (possibly on the day of the surgery, depending on my K+). After that, I don't know. It will just depend on my daily labs. Once I get home, my dialysis Tx's will return to the same schedule (545a Tues/Thurs/Sat).

The surgery itself will present possible complications such as bleeding, infection, blood clots, stroke, etc. One of the things the surgeons will do to lessen possible infection will be to extensively irrigate the area around the kidneys once they have extracted the organs. All the icky, discolored fluid in the cysts can apparently be quite nasty on the body if it is not irrigated out.
There is always the possibility that the surgery could go from laproscopic to fully open, due to any unforeseen issues they encounter during the procedure. Let's hope that all goes well and this is not necessary!

When the kidneys are being extracted the surgical team will roll me on one side (say the R), puncture the cysts and kidney, take out the L kidney, clamping the artery, veins and ureter; then roll me onto the other side and do the same to the R kidney. Once all the irrigation is finished and on the way out, the surgeons will repair the hernia under my navel (belly button) just before closing up.

I will then be a guest of IMC for 3-7 days, depending on how I am doing.

So, there you have it! I've been waiting a long time for this day, and it is but two weeks away! It's really a weird place to be, mentally...getting excited to have two of your seven vital organs removed. But, after the last six months, I am way past ready to get them out! I was telling the surgeon about the sharp pains I had the other day--I talked about them in my last entry--and he just shook his head and said, "It's definitely time to get them out if you can feel the cysts popping!"

If you have any questions, please feel free to leave them in the comments. I will answer as soon as I am able.

Good Health to All!

ScottW