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Knee Surgery Hospital Horrors and Highlights

Posted , 15 users are following.

jenny80029
jenny80029

This TKR recovery is a long haul!   We WILL get there in the end.  I am still looking back from time to time to my time in hospital.  I was fortunate to have a very positive experience, which was a relief because I have had some bad experiences in hospital in the past.  What I would like to suggest for this thread, as a bit of entertainment more than anything else, is for people to post ONE (just one!) hospital highlight and ONE (just one!) hospital horror.  Probably keeping fairly brief would be best if possible.  It could be entertaining!   My start is:

highlight...the first time I stood up.  I could feel my operated leg was wonderfully straight and it hasn't been that way for years!  

horror...the time I realised that my nightdress was just that little bit too short.  I hadn't factored in the fact that when using a walker you have to lean forward.  I also hadn't registered that my fellow patient had visitors as I trundled off to the toilet...leaning forward!!!  lol

1 like, 106 replies

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  • Duckfan
    Duckfan jenny80029

    Posted

    Should have done a better job checking my posts. Wee in a circle should have been we were. I'm still laughing about wearing in a circle. Yea, that's what they teach us at pt in Mercia, wearing in a circle. Gotta know how to do that before they release you from the hospital. Heck with the rom🤣🤣

  • marilyn10235
    marilyn10235 jenny80029

    Posted

    Hi Jenny, love this

    Highlight, laughing with the theatre tech (who also moonlights as a singer!), nice to go into theatre laughing!

    Horror, the dreaded morphine, talking to my son & I just fell asleep...mid sentence. Also talking to the Physio ditto! Food & drink not staying down, you name it......

    Still went into hospital 12.30 Monday, discharged Thursday 13.30...Heaven (apart from the dodgy knee)!

    Lol

    XX

    • chris00938
      chris00938 marilyn10235

      Posted

      I forgot to say about the horror of waiting just outside theatre, shivering with cold, and then they say 'cold liquid coming down your back' and you feel as though a bucket of iced water has been chucked at you LOL!

  • jan01779
    jan01779 jenny80029

    Posted

    I has a good hospital experience too generally

    Horror😲😲😲

    Admitted 07.30 saw anaethetist who converted me from planned GA to epidural plus sedation due to neck and jaw restriction meaning difficult to intubate. Mortified as remembered the noise of those bone saws /drills from my student nurse days. Just kept repeating I am able to listen to my music aren't I? ! In fact I'd now have my second the when needed under epidural as they were able to top up the pain relief which helped.

    Highlight: ( there were several 🤡🤡wink

    A 93 year old tkr patient , an ex school teacher, in the bed next to me who was inspirational and such fun. Her and I were having a better time of it than the 2 tkr ladies opposite us. They just kept asking how we could lift our leg in out of the bed so easily as it hurt. She point blankly told them you've had bone carpentry just get on with it of course it's going to hurt.

    She was a hoot, well read and great company.If my physio had given me information she had not got she would be on their case.

    Happy weekend all Jan x

  • Eizie
    Eizie jenny80029

    Posted

    I had a great hospital experience. I had a private room. It was like a country club. My actual surgery that I was scared "poopless" about was great....spinal anesthetic and some versed concoction in my arm...woke up 3 hrs later, both knees done, "fresh as a daisy"!😉 My most unlikeable experience was PT coming in the next morning saying time to get up!😳 I had heard it would probably happen but I was like horrified that they wanted me to get my 3 ton knees anywhere near the flippin floor!😳😳😳😳. So we tried and I proceeded to faint but thankfully on the bed! Tried again, got up, "walked" a few steps and back to bed! For flippin sake, what did that accomplish? I just wanted to lay on my rear in bed! What is this walking stuff when you're still druggy, tired, etc?? I know you have to do it and should do it but I sure as hell didn't have to be happy about it especially with my rear so lovingly displayed! And I won't even go into going up steps the next day!! PTs are crazed!!🤣🤣🤣🤣 Again I know it's their job and thanks to them I'm walking and doing pretty good 12 weeks post bilateral! Have a good day "kneebies" as Chico says I believe!!??🙏

    • chris00938
      chris00938 Eizie

      Posted

      Oh LOL!  My lot got us into our own nightwear before getting us up, so I'm thankful for that LOL!  Someone told me about a lady who refused to get out of bed after her tkr, terrified.   Not sure how they got her out eventually - possibly a shove by a physio LOL!

    • jenny80029
      jenny80029 Eizie

      Posted

      I fainted too when attempting that first stand up.  And I fainted later when sitting down.  My blood pressure was low which didn't help!  The other patients looked very worried when I came round! The extra oxygen was nice though!  Spent the next two days with a cooling fan and the window open.  Found out I was anaemic post op, and this probably didn't help! neutral

    • chris00938
      chris00938 jenny80029

      Posted

      I'm quite relieved to hear of someone else who had the same problem.  I was like this for a couple of weeks or so when I got home too.  I wouldn't shower on my own for a little while because just standing to shower was leaving me feeling faint, but it gradually wore off.  It was the same when I had a hysterectomy too, so guess that's just how my body responds to surgery.  I wasn't anaemic though.

  • eileen15268
    eileen15268 jenny80029

    Posted

    High light when a kind nurse washed & massaged my feet, was bliss.

    Horror . When I returned from surgery paralysed from the waist down ,I realised I should have been given a bed pan...Yuck

    • chris00938
      chris00938 eileen15268

      Posted

      LOL!  I'd read that a lot of people pee themselves when they come back and are still paralysed so don't realise so I sent off for some free sample incontinence pads and used one.  I didn't need it as it turned out (just peed all over my nightdress and knickers when I DID go to the loo LOL!) but the lady in the opposit bed didn't use a pad and she did it in the bed.  So I'll use one of the free samples when I have the other one done too!

    • jan01779
      jan01779 eileen15268

      Posted

      Yeah that paralysed feeling freaked me out.....its seemed a lifetime waiting to feel normal.Held on for ages for bed pan and it overflowed like Niagera Falls 😊

    • chris00938
      chris00938 jan01779

      Posted

      We had to do all our pees in a pot thing that sat on top of the loo in hospital, so they could measure and test them all, and mine overflowed too (I THINK this is how nightdress and knickers got wet).  I didn't know I needed to go until they asked me if I had, and I hadn't so they got the ultra sound thing out and informed my my bladder was 'full' so I needed to LOL!    Next time I think as soon as they come round with the walking frame, I'll go straight away!  SO long as I can move the leg! 

    • marilyn10235
      marilyn10235 jan01779

      Posted

      Oh yeah I remember that happening to me the night of my op. The nurse gave me a bedpan & it overflowed, all over the bed!!!

      I mean those cardboard things are tiny! Urghhh!

      Marilyn

      XX

    • chris00938
      chris00938 marilyn10235

      Posted

      My cardboard thing was in the loo - set into it, but I STILL managed to soak my nightdress and knickers LOL!    My lot were very strong on measuring every single wee though!
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