So my little Lily is haveing VSD closed up this friday, this will be open heart, and I'm just wondering what to expect. How long before we can see her after surgery? What will she be feeling, as far as pain and how sedated were your kids after surgery, and the days and weeks following? How long before they are back to themselves? Oh by the way, she is almost 6mo. A little insight would be nice. Thanks Ladies in advance.
Dana
St. Paul, MN
My son had his surgery 6 weeks ago, he was 5 weeks old so there may be some differences due to their age. But, James was away from us from about 2pm until it was finished at 8:30. The nurse called every hour to give an update. They brought him by the waiting room on the way to PICU, then we had to wait about 35 minutes for him to get settled there. That night he stayed on the ventilator because he was too sedated to breath for a while. He started opening his eyes about lunch time the following day, but he would go right back to sleep. The second day out of surgery was when the most changes were made as he slowly lost some of the IVs and stuff. He also was able to breastfeed that day. Until then he had 2 bottles of BM and that was all.
According to all the doctors, the actually surgery won't cause them any pain after they wake up, just the incision and the big hole where the drainage tube will be stitched in. They gave him tylenol for pain once we got to a room in telemetry, and we continued to give him tylenol for the first few days we were home. He didn't scream in pain or anything, I could just tell he didn't feel good.
It took about 3-4 weeks before he was completely back to normal (or better than normal as the surgeon said hehe). He healed amazingly fast and was smiling and playing even before we got discharged from the hospital. There will be some physical restrictions for 6 weeks (no buttons/snaps on the chest, can't pick them up under the arms, and has to have sponge baths only), that will probably be different for your little one though. Good luck with everything...if you have any questions or want to talk I'm always around. :)
My daughter has had 2 open heart surgeries, the first at 4 weeks the second at 6 months. Both times, as soon as she was stable in recovery, they allowed me back there. There wasn't any "pain" that I noticed her having or that she cried more than usual. It took a couple days after the second and she was totally back on her normal feeding schedule and everything. We were discharged just 7 days after the procedure! :-)
Best of luck, we all know how scary this can be!
Hey Dana, I just wanted to find out how the surgery went. Update when you can (when things settle down).
Hey, things went really well. Surgery was on the 21st. She was off the vent the 22nd. eating from a bottle later that night. And nursing on the 23rd. We were moved out of the PICU the 24th and got to take her home the 26th. Amazing!! We are so happy and blessed. I look at her and would never guess she had anything done. When the surgeon came to tell us she was done with surgery, he told us that her VSD was a lot bigger than what they originally thought and that it was one of the biggest he had seen. We were surprised, they also found some problems with the valve and another hole. Crazy, I'm so glad she is doing so well, in the hospital we were told she was having the best possible outcome. Thank GOD!!! We go back next wed. for a check up. Thank you for all your support.
Dana
Yay. I'm glad to hear that it went so well. She'll have fun making up stories about her scar in a few years I'm sure. :)
amnio test came back
- Dana4
on Aug. 19, 2009 at 12:00 PM