Post knee replacement concerns

Bridget, contact the hospital, they can arrange for your mum to be checked by your local doctor, results are accessible by the hospital and they can take any appropriate action. It is apparently essential that your mum does not start a course of antibiotics which your local doctor may prescribe.

I think you should contact the hospital. When I had my knee replacement 3 years ago I was in hospital for 9 days so she will only just have come out of hospital anyway. She may have picked up the infection in hospital (this happened to me once).

Whatever you do do not ignore it.

Sarah

Heat around the knee is normal as it's the bodies way of dealing with the replacement. Mine is still hot to touch 10 weeks after (although nowhere near as bad as it was). If she is hot elsewhere or has a temperature then you're best to get it checked. My hospital has an outpatients clinic that I was told to attend with any queries or concerns. Maybe call and see if yours have something similar?

The hospital will have the results of your mums MRSA swabs (they use these results to determine what specific antibiotics are needed as we all have different bacteria) so they would be best.

However go to the GP if not. It's worth it even to just put your mind at rest. Better to be safe x

Call the doctor

Call a GP ASAP

If the heat is just in the knee /leg it is more than likely just the healing process......if it is an all over body heat, you need to be very concerned and get her to an emergency room immediately.

My original tkr resulted in a very high temp within 48 hrs and it turned out to be a global/system wide staph and required an infectious disease doc intervening. My stay in the hospital went from the anticipated 4 day to a 12 day stay. 9 years later I had a revision and the day after surgery I fell breaking my femur which required surgery and a hip to knee plate being inserted with screws. Leg healed beautifully but due to the skin rubbing the plate, I had a terrific irritation so a simple outpatient surgery removed the plate. Exactly 28 days later I became very I'll, naseau, swelling, drainage and very inflamed knee requiring surgery to open the knee and cleaning, flushing, 8 weeks of antibiotic infusion and 10 months of antibiotics orally. The antibiotics quit working the staph returned and they had to remove the entire prosthesis and today I finish 8 weeks of antibiotic infusion and wait another 6 weeks to get another prosthesis installed. I don't mean this as a scare tactic but just to show how infections differ and what the effects are. You never go wrong in getting a doc involved with this type of surgery. Just the fear of the unknown can really slow the process. Again, at this stage, if the heat is xibdined to the joint area you probably are o.k but should get in asap to the surgeon. However, any unusual drainage, system wide fever or Nausea my opinion is don't wait, get to an emergency room immediately

Don't understand why my post is being moderated as I didn't link yo to anything or violate any of the other guidelines as far as I could see. Hope they don't hold it so long the advice is outdated. This time I'll hold it to this: if she is hot all over you should b probably get her to an emergency room at once

If its just the immediate area of the knee, at least call the surgeon asap. In the meantime, elevate the knee and ice it 20 mins at a time.

Trust your own instincts Bridget,get in touch with the hospital, hope all goes well, best wishes

I would get the hospital to have a look and check your Mum over ASAP. My 81 year old Father had an ankle replacement last year & after three weeks his ankle became infected and he tried to be "casual" about it as it was just hot in the ankle area and he didn't feel ill! We contacted the hospital (UK NHS) and were told to get him there urgently where he was admitted to a bone infection unit for immediate treatment! He spent two weeks in hospital on gallons of antibiotics and it was touch and go whether he'd lose his leg but he recovered I'm pleased to say, so please don't let your Mum ignore anything that might be a problem!😀