Surgery in less than a week and I'm sick

[hungryforchange 0]

Today is probably the worst but I have a horrible cold. My nose is stuffed up, my chest is tight, coughing feels like there are razor blades in my throat, I have a headache and overall, I'm just miserable.

I guess chances are good that I will be feeling better by Monday (surgery date), but I doubt that I will be 100% healthy by then.

Should I be concerned. Did anyone else go in with a cold?

[Arria 0]

I had a pretty severe case of bronchitis/laryngitis that lasted for a month right before surgery. I was coughing regularly until about 5 days before my scheduled surgery, but I had about 5 good days of recovery, and fortunately my lungs were clear by then. I would call your surgeon's office immediately and let them know that you have a cold, they won't want to operate on you if your lungs are congested, and believe me, it's already difficult enough doing the deep breathing exercises right after the surgery...I can't even imagine doing them with the kind of chest congestion a cold brings on. Also, I believe that your chances of getting Pneumonia are higher after surgery, and I can only imagine that they would increase if you are already ill.

[Txchloe 0]

I made almost this exact post last Wed night (my surgery was scheduled for Thurs a.m.). Didn't really get any replies from anyone that had experienced same. I did go in as planned on Thurs a.m. and first asked the receptionist if I was going to be sent away. She brought the nurse out who said "don't worry about it if you don't have a fever." I didn't have a fever. All the pre op stuff was done and then when the doc came in I again brought up the subject of my cough and stopped up nose. He went and got a flashlight and looked down my throat and said there didn't appear to be any infection (strep I guess?) so there shouldn't be as problem. I asked ONE more time when the anesthesiologist came in to hook me up to the sleepy meds. :notagree He was unconcerned as well. Oh well.....off I went.

I REALLY did not want them to cancel since I had been on liquids for a week and was mentally psyched to go forward. On the other hand I kept wondering how I was going to be able to be put under with tube and all when I was coughing (deep chest coughing) every few minutes; or more importantly was I going to wake up:eek:!

Well here I am on Day 6 and I did survive. Glad to have it over and evidently I had no problems during surgery. I do have to say though that the coughing, which got worse after surgery instead of better, has been very painful on my incisions. I think that my recovery has been much slower because of battling getting well as well as trying to heal after the surgery. :sick

I'm sorry about the long story with really no advice for you, but I think my answer is "it depends." Monday is still pretty far away and if you generally recover fairly quickly from respiratory things then you'll likely be fine. But, if you are like me, and you already have allergies and respiratory things tend to hang on, I might consider postponing another week if possible. Apparently it's not life threatening to have the surgery when you are sub par physically, but I do think it really makes the recovery tougher. I hope this helps some.

I think it's always best to contact your doc's office and bounce it off of them as I'm sure each doc has his/her own ideas about this. I should have done that but was afraid they were going to postpone, so I didn't. Smart huh?

Good luck--- and again I'm sorry about the long post but this was a topic that is still near and dear to my heart (especially when I cough!)

[Telecia 1]

call your surgeon and ask. Since you still got a few days he/she may perscribe or tell you to go to your personal doc to get something for the cough. You may be on your way over the cold by the time surgery comes up even.

But theres no reason for you to be miserable going into surgery if your doctors can do something about it.

As for what the surgeon will say. Everyones different, some wont be to concerned about it others will. So its best to call and be on the cautious side.

[minidee 0]

You might want to try the Neti pot, this is a nasal wash that gets rid of the congestion, and sinus infections. Helped me alot!

[hungryforchange 0]

Thank you SO much for the replies. I am still so miserable today and got very little sleep last night. Constantly coughing and up and down trying to blow my nose, etc.

I called my surgeon's office today and am waiting to hear back from them. I'll let you know what they say. At this point I'm hoping for a reschedule because I do not want to be worried that everytime I cough after the surgery that I'm going to ruin something.

Plus, breathing feels so heavy and hard right now, I worry about how it will go through surgery.

Thanks again!

[mariaxoxo4u 0]

I'm scheduled for Nov. 9th and last week (Thursday) woke up with sinus infection / bronchitis. Went to my regular doctor, he prescribed Zithromyecin (Z-Pac for short, it's an antibiotic, 5 day regiment) I'm MUCH better but I still have some residual, severe coughing. Went to pre-op at the hospital and they told me depending on how I look, feel and how my chest sounds on the day of surgery, that will determine if they need to postpone it - I really hope I'm OK by the 9th! If you are REALLY sick, I would suggest going to the doctor, you know, play it safe - I hope you'll be ok!!! Good luck!!

Maria

[make33 2]

All I'd say to both of you, Maria and Hungryforchange, is be careful of the meds you take before surgery. Make sure you tell the hospital staff EVERYTHING you have taken in the past week before surgery.

[mariaxoxo4u 0]

Hi Make 33,

Absolutely, I'm definately all for being totally honest about how I'm feeling, all the meds I've taken etc.. even if it results in a postponement of surgery (Yikes, I'm praying I won't have to.)

Thanks for your reply!

Maria

[karenr204 0]

I felt a cold coming on a week before having surgery and took some cold fx. It seemed to work to keep the cold away.

[Kele_Kana 0]

I went in with a cough, but the anesthesiologist listened to my chest and found me clear enough for surgery. It was the end of a cough and I could sleep and breath well, so I figured I'd be fine.

But when I came out of surgery, having to cough proved to be a HUGE problem for me. Oh the pain! They told me to "splint" my belly with a pillow when I had to cough to minimize the pain, and though it helped some, it didn't help much. I found myself sitting there for several minutes at a time, my husband holding my hand, just trying to get one cough out. I couldn't do it because I knew how it felt. Now, the docs will encourage you to cough after surgery so you can clear your lungs of any gunk that settled while you were out (to avoid lung infection), but personally the less coughing I could do the better; so the cough I really wish I could've let fade before going in.

Sneezing...holy cow. I'm allergic to just about everything, so I was surprised to find that I didn't need to sneeze. I've literally sneezed twice since my surgery, but they were not pretty. OUCH! Since then, though my port site seems to have healed, I've avoided sneezing at all costs because even the memory of the pain keeps me from getting it out. Kind of like negative reinforcement for a pet or child...haha.

Anyway, this isn't meant to scare you, just sharing my experience. I found myself saying that I should've let the cough go away; and it seemed my port site took a tad longer to heal than others, maybe because of the coughing and how my ab muscle was involved in having to do so. But as mentioned above, definitely tell the docs about it. They told me as long as I didn't have a fever and my lungs sound clear I should be fine, but you're obviously not me. =D

Good luck!

[Kele_Kana 0]

If they clear you and you decide to go through with it, try using Delsym. It's a medicine that controls the need to cough, as opposed to expectorants that help you cough and get the yucky stuff out. It helped me anyway, and my husband swears by the stuff. I still tried to cough as doctor suggested, to clear my lungs, but Delsym kept me from coughing excessively.

Oh, and Ricola makes this sugar-free Lemon Mint (or something like that) throat drop. These helped me A LOT too, but must admit they're quite addictive. To me they were like candy...sooo good!

Hope this helps!