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Posted by Claire
on June 23, 2009, 16:23:29, in reply to "Upcoming surgery"
90.197.146.138
Hi Laura,
You're not being silly at all as it is natural to feel worried and scared and you obviously want to make sure you are fully informed about the surgery and everything Mia will be going through.
I'm sure the admissions secretary can arrange for you to meet or speak to Mr Anderson before Mia is admitted as we were always advised that this was a possibility. We didn't meet with or speak to Mr Austin (who performed George's surgery) until the morning of George's op but he spent at least 30 minutes with us telling us exactly what he was expecting to see and what he was going to do to repair George's heart. Normally you meet with the surgeon the night before surgery but Mr Austin had an urgent case to deal with hence our morning meeting. I'm not sure whether you normally get a chance to speak to the surgeons on the day of surgery other than if you catch them first thing before they start their day. They can perform 3 operations in the one day and they also accompany each child to PICU to ensure they are stable before they are ready to start on the next op. However, the surgeons are so lovely and fully understand how emotional you will be that I'm sure they will go out of their way to speak with you before surgery if they can. Mr Austin answered every one of our questions in detail and we were very reassured. He was very matter of fact with regards to the associated risks and these will be listed individually in the consent form but we were left feeling that George was in the safest hands.
I would recommend that you write down your questions ready for when you speak with Mr Anderson. I expect you will be so overcome with emotion that you won't be able to think too straight (and there will probably be tears too). Don't worry about asking questions that you may consider to be silly as I'm sure Mr Anderson would rather answer everything that is on your mind to make sure you are as reassured and comfortable as you can be. You will also get to speak with Mr Anderson after the surgery and he will tell you how everything went from his point of view. The surgeons are in PICU most days too so you will get several opportunities to speak with Mr Anderson post surgery.
On the morning of the op you will also meet with the anesthetist so it can be a bit busy (and Mia will probably be crying for food) but once again we did not feel rushed and he answered all of our questions.
After we left George in theatre we went for a look around PICU and met the nurse who would be looking after George. I'm not sure whether it is better to go to PICU the day before as we didn't take in too much that was being said to us but it also meant we weren't overly worried about the machines, ventilators etc. as our minds were on George. I would recommend you have a tour of PICU though before Mia is moved there post surgery just so you are aware of the layout etc and can rush straight to Mia when you get the phone call.
The pre-op checks are quite lengthy as it took us about 4 hours with very little waiting around so be prepared for that and make sure you have something to keep Mia amused in those breaks.
My one bit of advice is not to be too concerned about the time of the op. We were told that Mr Austin would rather do a good job than feel rushed so if he felt it necessary to do one step again to get a better result he would do. We were advised that George would probably be down for 3-4 hours in total whereas it turned out to be over 5 and he was right as rain but we almost ran to PICU.
If there is anything at all you want to ask please don't be worried about doing another posting as you don't want to bottle anything up and have things playing on your mind so we will do whatever we can to answer your questions. If you want to speak off line about anything let me know as George is only about 6 weeks post surgery so it is all fresh in our minds.
Claire
xxx
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