Robotic surgery

[ClareLynn 153]

I had my surgery on the 24th and the surgeon used the DaVinci robot. Some things I didn’t realize before:

* they tie up your arms over your head to get them out of the way
* I had a small bruise on my wrist from the restraint
* My shoulders hurt, not just from gas, but also that position. The muscles are seriously mad at me. Every time I try to lower myself into a chair, or get out of bed it makes my shoulders hurt super bad.
* I have a mystery cut on my upper arm that I haven’t had a chance to ask the surgeon about. Looks like they fixed it up for me. I’m guessing my skin got pinched (I have loose skin there from losing weight and it’s paper thin and tears easily).

All of my incisions are incredibly small, maybe less than 1”. None of the incision sites hurt, or are bruised or swollen. There ended up being 5 incisions. One just under my chest, another next to my belly button, then three on my lower abdomen.

The surgery took 2 hours for a SADI.

I was in terrible pain post op, it took several days to get a handle on it. Luckily they were fine with giving me whatever I needed to make the pain stop, as often as needed. I have stage IV endometriosis so some of the pain was probably from my adhesions too.

So I’m not really sure if the robot made it better than normal surgery? It made some things worse and others better.

[Lifestyle Changer 49]

1 minute ago, ClareLynn said:

I had my surgery on the 24th and the surgeon used the DaVinci robot. Some things I didn’t realize before:

* they tie up your arms over your head to get them out of the way
* I had a small bruise on my wrist from the restraint
* My shoulders hurt, not just from gas, but also that position. The muscles are seriously mad at me. Every time I try to lower myself into a chair, or get out of bed it makes my shoulders hurt super bad.
* I have a mystery cut on my upper arm that I haven’t had a chance to ask the surgeon about. Looks like they fixed it up for me. I’m guessing my skin got pinched (I have loose skin there from losing weight and it’s paper thin and tears easily).

All of my incisions are incredibly small, maybe less than 1”. None of the incision sites hurt, or are bruised or swollen. There ended up being 5 incisions. One just under my chest, another next to my belly button, then three on my lower abdomen.

The surgery took 2 hours for a SADI.

I was in terrible pain post op, it took several days to get a handle on it. Luckily they were fine with giving me whatever I needed to make the pain stop, as often as needed. I have stage IV endometriosis so some of the pain was probably from my adhesions too.

So I’m not really sure if the robot made it better than normal surgery? It made some things worse and others better.

I had my surgery on 11/01. My surgeon used the robotic for my surgery I have 6 incisions. According to the nurses they told me my arms were ace bandaged to my sides. My legs were belted on the operating bed. I do know I so much scar tissue that my surgeon had to use the robotic for removal. My surgeon told me that the scar tissue was on my liver and it was thick it took an hour and half to remove using the robotic. Also scar tissue was wrapped around my stomach like a rope he wasn’t sure my gastric sleeve could be done. He found a piece of residual band in bedded underneath my stomach from when I had the Lapband in 2008. It was removed in 2012 as it had eroded. There was huge amount of scar tissue on the right outer stomach wall which took considerable amount of time to remove. He removed some scar tissue from my bowels as well. My surgery originally was to be 2 hours ended up taking 4 hours. My surgeon said my surgery was very tough due to the amount of scar tissue imbedded. He said it appears much of the scar tissues was most like from the years of having endometriosis removed when I had my hysterectomy years ago. He also said it looked as if the tissues wasn’t removed properly which was what caused the damaging build up I had when he was doing my gastric sleeve. After my surgery my shoulders hurt bad and the back of my neck which I ended up with a Migraine. My left leg had a bruise on the middle of the calf. That is my leg I have problems with. My left leg is easily bruised. Due to my arms bandage to my sides from surgery they were a little sore but not bad. It felt like I just banged up against the doorway.

I can’t understand why your arms would be tied above your head. It seems bizarre. Did you as your doctor why they did that and what the reason was?

[ClareLynn 153]

He said it kept them out of the way and made more room for the robot. The surgeon himself has had gastric surgery too, with the robot, and said that they did the same with his arms and they hurt for days.

I agree it’s a bit unexpected and I do wish my arms weren’t so sore.

[huskymama 149]

I get the sleeve December 22 - I have a torn left shoulder if they put it over my head I’ll be in big trouble pain wise I’ll have to be sure to discuss this with my surgeon