Chase back from primary w/Belzberg
Posted: Mon Jun 27, 2005 11:54 am
Hello all,
We're back from having primary w/Dr Belzberg and Dr Redett. Chase seems to be doing great. As it turns out, he avulsed C8-T1, C7 is questionable, and C5-C6 were trashed but they hope there's a connection (pathology on these is not good, but this is where they did all their work). They connected spinal accessory to suprascapular for shoulder stability and harvested surals from lower legs for all the grafting on C5-C6. Legs don't look so great, but they only made 3 nice incisions in shoulder/inner arm and glued all incisions. The surgery was quite long as expected - 11 hrs and the first 1 1/2 days post-op were ugly, but once he got off the IV, he turned the corner (he was too drugged up/!) Surgery was 6/23 and we flew home 6/26 am. His pain seems to be great, only taking Tylenol and his gabapentin. We are very pleased with Dr Belzberg and Dr Redett, they make an excellent team and Belzberg is an incredible person and very down to earth. He's already called us at home and would like to continue w/phone clinics as Chase recovers. He told us with every decision during surgery, he imagined Chase being his own son and that helped in determining their "next move". I will say, their scheduling process seriously lacks and he agrees, but we traveled for his expertise and we are very pleased and thankful for him. While we were waiting in pre-op, we met a wonderful man named Bob, who had surgery w/Belzberg & Redett 2 days earlier and he came down to meet Chase to encourage him before going in to surgery. He's a great person with an incredible family and we spent our recovery days "hanging out" with them. It really made it nice to have someone with the same injury to share and relate to. Unfortunately, this man has severe pain and is staying on for pain management, but we will continue to pray for him and hope to encourage him to check out UBPN for support. Thank you all for your care, support and suggestions - you've made a huge difference in our lives with this injury and we hope to be able to reach out to others as well. Take care!
Lourdes
We're back from having primary w/Dr Belzberg and Dr Redett. Chase seems to be doing great. As it turns out, he avulsed C8-T1, C7 is questionable, and C5-C6 were trashed but they hope there's a connection (pathology on these is not good, but this is where they did all their work). They connected spinal accessory to suprascapular for shoulder stability and harvested surals from lower legs for all the grafting on C5-C6. Legs don't look so great, but they only made 3 nice incisions in shoulder/inner arm and glued all incisions. The surgery was quite long as expected - 11 hrs and the first 1 1/2 days post-op were ugly, but once he got off the IV, he turned the corner (he was too drugged up/!) Surgery was 6/23 and we flew home 6/26 am. His pain seems to be great, only taking Tylenol and his gabapentin. We are very pleased with Dr Belzberg and Dr Redett, they make an excellent team and Belzberg is an incredible person and very down to earth. He's already called us at home and would like to continue w/phone clinics as Chase recovers. He told us with every decision during surgery, he imagined Chase being his own son and that helped in determining their "next move". I will say, their scheduling process seriously lacks and he agrees, but we traveled for his expertise and we are very pleased and thankful for him. While we were waiting in pre-op, we met a wonderful man named Bob, who had surgery w/Belzberg & Redett 2 days earlier and he came down to meet Chase to encourage him before going in to surgery. He's a great person with an incredible family and we spent our recovery days "hanging out" with them. It really made it nice to have someone with the same injury to share and relate to. Unfortunately, this man has severe pain and is staying on for pain management, but we will continue to pray for him and hope to encourage him to check out UBPN for support. Thank you all for your care, support and suggestions - you've made a huge difference in our lives with this injury and we hope to be able to reach out to others as well. Take care!
Lourdes