Pre Op Day

I made it to the Ortho's doctor's office almost on time. I allotted 10 minutes to drive there and of course not 1/2 mile from my house the lane was blocked because of an early morning traffic accident. I've never been good at taking an alternate route but I chose to do that instead of waiting. Luck was with me and I didn't get lost but I wasn't on time, but only a few minutes late.

This visit was with the P.A. to get consents signed and confidentiality agreement signed. I had a few questions for him about ligaments; do they tighten them during the surgery? My other concern was the length of the leg after surgery. The ligaments will be restored to natural control and the leg will be restored to same length. I know this might sound like a ignorant question but I have seen patients that awake to find they have a permanent limp. My last question was because of the hardware already in my knee; what's my chances of developing a raging infection. He said they do about 600 knees a year and 1% have problems with infection. I hope that 1% has been achieved before my time to go in.

The surgery he said will be an hour long skin to skin which means from the time he starts the surgery and closes; the time in holding and post op of course will add extra hours to the time I'm out of my room and back. So far so good.

Next stop was to a building about 4 blocks away that is part of the hospital. The usual insurance information which took longer then any of the Pre Op tests. Blood work, x rays and cardiac rhythm strip and I was on my way to the Blood Bank to get a unit pulled and banked. I took a left instead and went home. Enough for one day!
I'll go have the blood pulled later this week. I have a month to get it done. I'll save some of this fun for another day. I'll have to make 2 visits to the Blood Bank as they can only pull one unit a week and I need a total of 2 units banked before the surgery.

I'll have a morphine pump for 2 days following surgery. I can't began to tell you how happy that makes me. Morphine makes me itch and vomit; it also makes me pain free so I'll tolerate the itching and vomiting quite well thank you very much!

This is the third time on this knee; hopefully the last time too. I haven't started whining yet but I have a month to get in the "whine mode". I'll be listening close to my tone of voice for the next 30 days. I'll let you know if I hear any whining.