Week 1 after Rib Resection Surgery for Thoracic Outlet Syndrome

hey everyone just coming in for a one-week update I was actually planning on doing it on Monday which was day seven and then I ended up getting a little bit sick so we're delayed till Tuesday I'm actually exactly one week after surgery today the process has been kind of varying I would say date one which is when I did my last video I was up and about really really good I was able to walk around the wing of the hospital really well no problem and then maybe in the evening on day one or the morning of day two is when I really noticed that the soreness started to to kick in so that it's felt like a muscle soreness since they took out here's the collarbone and then the rib kind of lies right underneath here the soreness it's like right here and then on the back part but it will kind of directly through in a desk feel like like you've worked out intensely or as someone's punched you it's a very very deep sort muscle soreness if you cough it hurts so I was on toradol injections every six hours for the first 24 hours and then they stopped those and then they switched me over to ibuprofen 600 I was still having some breakthrough pain we did some oxycodone and that's what I actually got discharged with so their regimen when I got out of the hospital which was actually on Thursday was oxycodone one every six hours for breakthrough pain that's not really with Tylenol and they had me on a thousand milligrams of Tylenol every six hours now with that I refused to do it every six because that would put you at four grams a day in about a year or two well a couple of years ago they actually switched the the maximum tile amount per day should be thirty six hundred milligrams so what I had been doing was a thousand milligrams which is to the extra strength tylenol every eight hours and then I was also doing 600 and they said that I've been doing that on a scheduled basis not just as needed but every six hours for 15 days so then I was discharged on Thursday maybe around noontime and I still had a JP drain in so it's a drain that they put on the side of your chest underneath your arm so all of like the extra fluid and the blood can kind of drain out and to be able to avoid a hematoma from developing so I had I was discharged on Thursday with that drain and then on Friday morning I was able to go into their outpatient clinic and have them remove it but I did notice is that way I started having a lot of shortness of breath and so I started having to sleep very I didn't sit very upright I had to sleep upright in the hotel I had about maybe three pillows propping me up and so that was a little bit bothersome and when they did the surgery initially they did a chest x-ray I made sure that there wasn't any of the pleura that was poked so there weren't any like any issues of pneumothorax nothing like that so when I went in on Friday they did another chest x-ray just to make sure you know nothing had happened and they said that there was something that like a little bit of a delight to assess is basically maybe partial collapse along very small and that's usually anesthesia based and so what you do is deep breathing exercises you're doing the very deep diaphragmatic breathing so I'll try to point it down diaphragmatic breathing not from here where's your shoulders moving up but dyfan hold it in hold it in and then maybe about eight to ten seconds and then breathe it out slowly and they said do about ten deep breaths every hour and then also cough so coughing hurts a little bit it helps if you brace yourself with the pillow a little bit so you would for example if you feel the cough is coming you can sit in a chair you'd sit the chair kind of brace the back hold the pillow and my and then that way you feel like there's some support instead of just resume and completely I think it does help so I got the Giant taken out on Friday and then I flew back home from Minnesota on Saturday and so that one I had to plan my medications in advance so I did buy Tylenol of ibuprofen before I got on a shuttle and the shuttle because I was I had a go on a shuttle that was about maybe an hour in ten minutes to an hour and 20 minutes to get to the airport and then my flight wasn't until like 11:30 so I decided to do I've broken and tunnel before I got on the shuttle and then I did like a tablet of oxycodone right before the plane took off to kind of deal with the unsettling feeling because I couldn't stay seated in one position for a really long time came back Sunday I was still noticing issues with the breathing and so what we figured out is that in the beginning part I needed to take oxycodone ibuprofen and Tylenol all together for me to get adequate pain relief and then when I had enough pain relief I was able to breathe better so what happens is when I'm in pain my body is subconsciously guarding it can make you feel like you're short of breath so it's if you're experiencing anything like that make sure you get the chest x-ray done because oxycodone can also cause respiratory depression it can slow down your breathing so you don't want to take anything like that unless you know you're okay but it could also be unmanaged pain and I didn't realize it would manifest that way but I got that fixed and then so I did that on Sunday and that seemed to be better and then on Monday I decided how I'm gonna eat just really light I was just gonna have I had a cup of coffee and then I had like two like two slices of cantaloupe thinking that would be for my medication it was not do not try to oh I'm trying to lose weight or whatever eat a decent amount of food when you're gonna have to take the meds because otherwise you will feel very sick I was basically nauseous all day and had to eat very very minimally and now I'm doing better so this is technically j8 this is one week after surgery and um I just took two Tylenol this morning which was still kind of painful um I was kind of up and about for about an hour and now I can feel like I'm a little bit short of breath and having a little bit more pain so I'm gonna just try to do it with ibuprofen at this point and see if I can get by without having to take the oxycodone because I do want to be able to drive again and and get back to my normal activities as soon as possible as far as restrictions the main thing that they told me is that I could not lift the surgery side arm more than 90 degrees so I couldn't go up higher than this I can stretch it to the side I can move it across but I can't go up higher than this and then also not lifting anything higher than heavier than five to ten pounds and that is mainly because I have an incision right here and the under arm and that we were trying to avoid that the stitches are coming out or they the wound separates and makes it a lot harder to heal I have been really used to do physical therapy after two weeks and they told me as far as I can exercise regimen I may be able to start running walking jogging bodyweight exercises possibly at two weeks but maybe better at four weeks and then possibly even after six weeks I could consider doing weight I am very reluctant about doing weight because I think that that's what may have triggered my issue with thoracic outlet syndrome in the first place but we'll see I know that I am motivated definitely motivated to start getting exercise again because I can feel the difference in my body compared to when I was working at before and before the injury and tonight before I go I did want to give clarification about something so I mentioned when I was in the hotel I did have to pop up with like at least three pillows and I had to sit it's like sleep upright as well especially when I was in a lot of pain so I had seen something like that when you two were on one of the websites so I invested in a wedge pillow that may be one of your best investments at this time so I wanted to show you what I had and then you can change the incline I have been using that for at least I think ever since I came back I've been using it very heavily and it does help to take some of the strain off when you're trying to relax a little bit and you're in pain on Amazon I say it's very affordable you just have to it comes like in a box and you do have to let it air out and takes about 8 to 10 hours to get to its full capacity but definitely worth it look into it so hopefully that's clear if I didn't think you had questions about if you have any other questions about what's happened to me this first week or highly-experienced was feel free to comment below make sure to LIKE subscribe share this with anybody who may be having any issues hopefully we can spread that awareness around thanks have a good one

Channel: Thoracic Outlet Syndrome: The Road to Recovery

Views: 8,246

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Id: FLvTigK6RxA

Length: 10min 31sec (631 seconds)

Published: Tue Jan 28 2020