Mike Kalahar's Surgery Log

We came to visit Dad at about 7:30 this morning. The night shift nurse says he did great all night with everything she asked him to do. They extubated him in the night, and are now asking him to use a couple of pieces of equipment to help prevent pneumonia. One encourages deep breathing, and the other loosens mucus in the lungs to help cough it up.

The site of the surgery is under a bandage, and very neat and tidy. He has a number of ivs currently, providing all kinds of fluids.

He has been eating ice chips, and trying to get his intestinal tract moving again. They brought him some jello, but he hasn’t eaten it yet.

They are managing the pain, which is significant (i.e. 8/10), with a combination of morphine and oxycodone. The majority of the pain is at the surgical site, but some is also due to his arthritis.

We still haven’t talked to the surgeons, but that should happen shortly.

His heart is still not ready to beat on its own, so he is still dependant on the pacemaker. I’m hoping the surgeon will give us more info when we talk.

If anyone has any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.

Mom and I saw dad briefly in the ICU this evening.  He was still very much in surgery recovery mode.  For the surgery, they cooled his body temperature and put his heart on ice (probably in the literal sense).  They put him on a heart and lung machine to keep his blood moving while they removed the heart and worked on it.  As a part of recovering from that, he’s been equipped with a breathing tube.  To help the heart recover from the stress of stopping it, they use a temporary external pacemaker.  When we saw him, he still had a breathing tube and a pacemaker.  His heart was running at a steady 80 bpm on the pacemaker.  His body was still cooler than normal, but they had him under an insulating / heating blanket of air with a special machine to keep it at just the right temperature.  This will help him to recover his normal body temperature.

Unfortunately, we were unable to speak to the surgeons directly today.  We did speak with the on-call resident, who had spoken with the surgeons and the anesthesiologist.  He reported that everything had gone as well as could possibly be expected, and that Dad is doing great.  We were a little shocked by the presence of the pacemaker, as we hadn’t been warned about it, but the doctors assure us this is a very normal part of the recovery process.  When Dad’s heart is once again beating happily on its own, they will remove the pacemaker wires, and it should all heal up nicely.  Also, Dad will have a wicked-awesome scar.

Mom has had a really hard time seeing Dad sedated heavily and hooked up to all kinds of machines.  We’re all wiped out from an extremely long day on mediocre-at-best sleep, but things are, all in all, going very well.  By morning, it’s likely they will remove his breathing tube, and it’s even possible his heart will be ready to beat on its own by then.  We’ll be able to see him, wake him up, and talk to him.  When we reach that point, I expect everyone will feel better.

Right now, Mom, Ashleigh and I are all at Meagan’s house.  Mom and I have been up since 4:30 or so, and fairly stressed all day.  The high point of Mom’s day was seeing the Ballard locks for the first time.  We didn’t hang around in the ICU, since Dad wasn’t conscious anyway.  Mom’s about to go to bed; Ashleigh and I will find some food and then try to sleep. Even with as little sleep as I have had recently, I’ll probably need some sort of distraction before I can sleep, but I expect mom to be out like a light any minute.

Dad’s in good hands, and being taken care of.  We’re all a bit worried still, but the most dangerous part is over.  Hooray for modern medicine!

Dad’s still in surgery. Mom, Jane-o, Harold, Ashleigh and I all went for a bike ride.  We rode about 20 miles from Meagan’s house where we are staying to my Aunt Sharron’s house (she wasn’t home, but we didn’t really have time to visit anyway), and back to Meagan’s house.

As we got back to the house, we got a phone call from the folks at UW Medical Center. They said the surgery is going well, and they’re reconnecting his heart and warming him (and his heart) back up. Apparently, the surgery is done with low body temperatures and with the heart itself on ice to slow its use of nutrients and preserve the heart muscle as much as possible. The warming of the heart indicates that much of the work is done, and he’s being reassembled (for lack of a better term).

In a few hours, we’ll head back to the hospital and stay in the waiting room until they call for us.  When they call for us, they’ll either give us more info or let us see him. When that happens, I’ll write more.

Dad’s headed in to surgery.

While he is there, they will cut open his chest, remove his heart, connect him to an artificial pump, swap out a heart valve with one from a pig, add a reinforced wall to his aorta, restart his heart, put it back, and close him up.

The idea that he will not have a heart in his chest for some period of time is a little freaky, but this is how it’s done. Twelve weeks from now he will be back on his bike, and getting back in shape. Medical science is amazing.

Dad is now in the preop room; Mom is with him. He has about 90 minutes of preop work to do, and then he will go in to surgery. We will go for a bike ride while he’s in the operating theater, and come back in time to meet him when he’s ready to see us.

Heart surgery is a tricky thing. There was an emergency case in the night, and the room Dad was scheduled for is in use. We were told that they will try to get him in as soon as there is a surgical suite that’s equipped for cardiac surgery. He can’t eat or drink anything, and we’re unsure how long the wait will be. The surgeon’s assistant gave an estimate of noon, but we had to promise not to fault him if it doesn’t prove accurate.

We’re waiting in the check-in line at UW Medical Center. The trip over from the house was quick and uneventful, but the check-in desk is surprisingly busy.

We are currently in the car travelling to Seattle. We will be staying at my cousin Meagan’s house. She has generously offered to give a us dog free place to stay. Since mom and I are both allergic to dogs, that is quite a blessing.

Tonight, Mom, Dad, Ashleigh, and I will all sleep at Meagan’s place. Tomorrow we will get up before breakfast and head to the hospital. Checkin time is 5:30, which is going to be pretty rough for some of us. If all goes according to plan, Dad will have some new parts installed while the rest of us go for a bike ride (to keep us distracted). Once Dad’s out of surgery, we’ll meet up with him again. I’ll write more as soon as I know more.

I’m just getting started getting the blog up and running. I’ll try to get Dad to write something that I can post tomorrow. I’ll also sit down and put together a list of important dates.