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From: Melissa
Date: 06/08/01
Time: 03:50:36
Well, I had my fundo last year and I went into the hospital on Monday morning, had the surgery, and stayed Monday night, and Tuesday night. I went home on Wednesday night, and I can't imagine going home even a single day earlier. Not unless one has the world's highest pain threshold! IHMO it is just plain a bad idea. They need to monitor how well you are doing. Check to make sure you don't get and infection and run a fever, or have a blood clot, as could happen after any surgery. It is prudent to watch you for awhile.
I've heard of two people who got a fundo from a surgeon (and the same one btw) who sends all his patients home from the hospital the same day. BOTH did very badly after their fundos. They had complications and had to go back to the hospital for testing much later to see what had gone wrong. And one of them said the techs in the hospital commented on the numerous patients of this same surgeon who didn't do too well and had to come back in for tests. Now, this surgeon was supposed to be very experience in performing the fundos, but I would want to know his success rate, so Jean I would advise you to ask about your surgeon's *success* rate not simply how many he has done, if you haven't already asked. I would also suggest you get references from him from prior patients. In addtion, you might want to post his name here and see if anyone has had him do his/her fundo and how good the outcome was.
My fundo was done at USC where they have performed *many* of these surgeries over the years (with excellent results), and the usual hospital stay is 2 1/2 to 3 days. So the surgeons there really are in a position to know the optimum time. As far as I'm concerned it's just right.
Those may be small incisions on the outside, but this surgery still involves a major rearrangement of your insides. That means a reasonable amount of time ought to be spent observing the patient. I don't think sending a fundo patient home on the same day of surgery is reasonable.
Melissa, Tessie@io.com