I am new to this site, having AVR week after Thanksgiving

[Shamrocknj]

Hi everyone, well I am a 59 year old woman who went from mild aortic stenosis to severe in 6 months, and I had plaque from my valve land in my left eye but it did not do any damage. Although I am symptom free, because of the plaque being thrown off by my valve, the doctors want me to have the surgery ASAP. I am going to Weill Cornell Columbia Presbyterian and Dr. Girardi is my surgeon. I have opted for the pig valve. What do I say, I am devastated and scared. I have no coronary heart disease and I am in great health, and I have no idea what lay in store. THe doctor told me I will be extremely fatigued and that I must take naps everyday and to expect back and neck pain. Is this your experience? I would love to hear from any or all of you....Shamrock

 

[Greg a]

Hi everyone, well I am a 59 year old woman who went from mild aortic stenosis to severe in 6 months, and I had plaque from my valve land in my left eye but it did not do any damage. Although I am symptom free, because of the plaque being thrown off by my valve, the doctors want me to have the surgery ASAP. I am going to Weill Cornell Columbia Presbyterian and Dr. Girardi is my surgeon. I have opted for the pig valve. What do I say, I am devastated and scared. I have no coronary heart disease and I am in great health, and I have no idea what lay in store. THe doctor told me I will be extremely fatigued and that I must take naps everyday and to expect back and neck pain. Is this your experience? I would love to hear from any or all of you....Shamrock

WELCOME to thde forum yes there is considerable fatigue but this can be short lived we all recover at different rates. As to the neck and back pain it is a factor due to the rib spreaders used to give your team a clear view. WAITING IS THE WORST PART !!!! If somethimg has you bothered or you are losing sleep over it JUST ASK in the forum you have found a family of great peoiple that have walked the walk.

 

[anutherbuddy]

Good luck to you. My DH had OHS 9 weeks ago. Fatigue, yes. Neck, shoulder, sternum pain, no. He's doing very well now - gaining endurance and weight (he had no appetite for several weeks but that's getting better, too). Get 'er done.

 

[pellicle]

dear Shamrock

I can't know how it feels to have this discovered late in life, because I had my first valve surgery when I was about 12 years old. Since then I have had a total of three surgeries: the valvotomy , a homograph tissue valve, and last year a mechanical. The only advice that I can really give you is to keep strong and keep in mind that while its very confronting surgery, they are very good at it and there are overwhelming numbers of excellent results.

Compared to your parents generation you have good options and far less likely to suffer the worse outcomes of leaving the valve in place.

I also advise listening closely to the surgeons advice and then going and reading up on that. You can benefit yourself by becoming a mini-expert in the topic. After all no one else is directly effected by this as much as you will be.

I wish you all the best, but I do have great faith in the surgical teams and ICU teams who will assist your recovery.

 

[Fundy]

You can get a reasonable indication of what recovery will be like from some youtube videos searching on the words HEART VALVE RECOVERY

Here's a couple, the first one is a series of 6 or 7 minute or two clips - covers the first week.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xinNz9WhG0A&feature=channel&list=UL


This one is series of clips covering about the first couple months
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFSO4O2FN-Y&feature=channel&list=UL

 

[CarolM]

I am 5 weeks post surgery (at age 57, almost 58), and experienced a lot of back pain myself. I had a modified sternotomy. Fatigue was HUGE initially, but each week it lifted.
Keep a positive outlook---how great your condition was caught now and you have a great hospital, too. I'd hazard a guess that if your health was good before this, then you will be a terrific candidate for a speedy recovery! Best wishes, Shamrock!

 

[karla]

The fatigue I felt postop was not as bad as the fatigue I felt before the surgery. The difference for me was resting actually helped after the surgery. Preop, I would wake up after 8 or 9 hours of deep sleep and wake up more tired than when I went to bed. I am still surprised every morning that I have energy and am anxious to get up and moving.
As far as back and shoulder pain....yeah,it was definitely there for me but the pain medication helped keep it tolerable. The other thing that helped was doing the upper body exercises I was given to do. If I didn't do them, I stiffened up pretty quickly.
Bottom line...it's all tolerable and gets better. Best wishes!

 

[Mom2izzy]

I felt like most of my fatigue was because I wasn't able to sleep very well or very long for the first few weeks. Once I was able to sleep better, the fatigue issue got better too.

I definitely felt the back, shoulder, neck pain. Partly because I can't take anything stronger than Tylenol without feeling nauseous. I found that a good therapeutic massage weekly helped and was worth every penny. If you have a good masseuse, they can do it in any position you are comfortable in, so you don't have to worry about not being able to lay on your stomach or flat on your back.

The other thing that really helped with the stiffness was walking. It could be a little tough to get going, but the more I moved, the looser I would get.

I'm 8.5 months out now, and looking back, it seems like it was much easier than I had expected. I was back to "normal" within 5-7 weeks and back at work at 8 weeks. Most days I don't even think about it.

 

[Mike1952]

Hi Shamrock,
It sounds like you are feeling what I was feeling in June and July. I was pretty much asymptomatic. I had a severely leaking aortic valve. My only symptom was a slight dizziness. I spent a lot of time worrying and trying to absorb the shocking information (my poor wife had to listen to me for weeks!). I am 60. I had the surgery on August 9th. The worst by far was the anticipation of what was to come. It has been over three months and I am feeling better all the time. The surgery and the hospital stay was out of my control and I tried to do whatever the nurses asked me to. Since getting out of the hospital (in 4 days), I immediately began walking several times a day until I was able to walk long walks. I am now walking 5 miles at a 4 mile an hour pace. The last month or so, I did feel some fairly severe chest pain after several days of exercising but an ultrasound showed the heart is ok. It now seems I may be past that stage.
I had very little pain in the hospital and immediately afterwards. The only pain was what I described above.
So, all this to say, if your experience is anything like mine, it won't be near as bad as you may be imagining.
I got a bovine valve, by the way.
Best of luck and welcome to the forum! It has really been so helpful to me to have people chime in with advice and their war stories!

 

[Duffey]

Hi everyone, well I am a 59 year old woman who went from mild aortic stenosis to severe in 6 months, and I had plaque from my valve land in my left eye but it did not do any damage. Although I am symptom free, because of the plaque being thrown off by my valve, the doctors want me to have the surgery ASAP. I am going to Weill Cornell Columbia Presbyterian and Dr. Girardi is my surgeon. I have opted for the pig valve. What do I say, I am devastated and scared. I have no coronary heart disease and I am in great health, and I have no idea what lay in store. THe doctor told me I will be extremely fatigued and that I must take naps everyday and to expect back and neck pain. Is this your experience? I would love to hear from any or all of you....Shamrock

Good luck and best wishes for a successful surgery and easy recovery. AVR is major surgery, but one that has become more refined and more easily recovered from with each passing year. You should do well.:smile2:
Mary

 

[Shamrocknj]

Thank you so much for your post...I am now 11 months post op and feel wonderful.

 

[clay_from_nj]

Fatigue after OHS? Nope. Pain? Nope. The worst discomfort I suffered through the whole thing was heparin injections shortly after my surgery. (I have a bottle of Percocet that the hospital sent home with me, insisting that I'll probably need it sometime. Took one for a headache a couple of months ago. I figure I'll take it into one of those "drug take-back" drives, or, maybe as the FDA advises, just flush it.)