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The day of the op.

Written by Stef at 29 Jun 2005 22:00:51:

After quite a wait, I was now going in for a Partial or Full Circumcision (see my previous postings of 5/19 & 5/24).
On the day, I arrived when the day surgery opened at 8am, & was very soon in a bed. I noticed as I went in that I was down to have it done "1st in the afternoon" on the day plan board on the wall. During the next few hours, a succession of hospital staff(nurses, a surgeon & an anaethsetist) came & asked lots of, mostly the same, questions in order to fill in forms.
I had gone to some lenghts to try to get a surgeon who would, if it was medically possible with my BXO, give me a Partial Circ, or as near to it as he could in my circumstances, & I had to explain this to allcomers to my bedside, in order to try to ensure that surgeon was the one who performed my op. It must be a huge advantage of having private treatment, that you are able to know for sure that the surgeon performing your op is the one that you have spent all your time discussing it with, especially if you have certain preferences which you wish him to try to adhere to. In the public sector, that really is a bit of a lottery.
The surgeon who came to my bedside was not the one I had discussed it all with, & I'm sure he was intending to do mine, & despite all my previous efforts to try for a partial, I still had this guy trying to tell me I should have a Full. I firmly suggested to him that my surgeon said he would carry it out, & he showed me the section on the consent form which reads that 'the hospital cannot guarantee an op will be carried out by a particular surgeon'. It also says 'but the surgeon will have the relevant expertise'. From previous experience, I found that surgeons with the expertise to carry out partials were few & far between, & this fella didn't seem to be one of them !
Probably because of me persistently asking for that one surgeon, I didn't actually go down for my op until 3.30pm. I had a general anaesthetic, & was awakened by the anaesthetist in the recovery room an hour later. I felt quite good, & I was straight away asked if I was in any pain & I said "only a little bit", & was given some Morphine. The pain was really minimal, & the morphine probably wasn't necessary, & it caused me to be sick a few times later on. As soon as I was back in the ward I took a peek at my op. Not much was visible, a cylinder of bandages about 2" long was around the wound, to about half inch beyond the tip of the glans, and the bandages were taped to the shaft, so only the tip of the glans could be seen.
The surgeon came to me soon after(not 'my' surgeon, the other one), & said that my favoured surgeon had performed the op, he had done a partial, & that he had stitched the wound up behind the glans to keep it stretched.
There was a lot of blood on my sheets, which was a bit scary, but I felt really comfortable apart from being sick twice, & I was told that I would be allowed home soon, providing I was not giddy, could walk straight & had stopped vomiting. I was given a painkiller pill, told to take another at 10pm, given a leaflet on aftercare, some prescription paracetamol & codiene & discharged about 7.30pm.
I was instructed to removed the bandages in 2 days, & keep them dry until then. More soon....


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