Nelson
New member
I am sixty-nine years old and had my aortic-valve replaced and my ascending aorta-aneurism repaired with a Dacron graft 25-days ago on December 6, 2011, by Dr. Craig Miller at Stanford University Hospital. The surgery took 7-hours. My replacement valve is an Edwards Lifesciences 25 mm bovine tissue valve. My recovery to date has been remarkably smooth, and I wanted to share my experience to somewhat mitigate the anxiety of others contemplating valve replacement surgery. Although I had read that the recovery experience of different patients varies significantly, I unfortunately heard far more negative experiences than positive ones. So going into the surgery I was extremely concerned about the possibility of a painful and long recovery period.
I was asymptomatic at the time of my surgery, and in pretty good physical condition, and guess that contributed to my positive post-surgery experience. Even so, I am motivated to offer my experience to offset some of the horror stories that I had come across in my research prior to my surgery. First, I experienced no post operative pain other than when I coughed, and that was easily treated with pain killers. I was completely off pain killers 3-weeks after surgery. I did have a few incidences of a very bad taste in my mouth for one day in the hospital, and a few days after arriving home, but cutting down on one of my medications resolved that This bad taste, which was very discomforting, is the worst of the effects i felt post surgery.
Second, 10-days post surgery, I was able to walk on a treadmill for 75-minutes at a time at an average speed of 3 mph with a few 5-minute "sprints" of 3.5 and 4.0 mph during the walk. My surgeon had said that I could not work my heart too hard during my recovery, and the cardiac rehab nurse at the hospital said that if I made sure to back off on my speed during exercise whenever I would start to experience breathlessness, I really could safely exercise without being monitored. My cardiologist has since told me that he would have liked to see me ramp up my exercise more slowly, and does want me to enter a cardiac rehab program so I can be monitored for a while. This may be because I experienced some minor afibrillation while in the hospital, and I am just now coming off the medication that was used to treat it. In the meantime, I have backed off to walking daily for only 45-minutes at an average speed to 3.3 mph, compared to my pre-surgery average speed of 3.8 mph.
I have some insomnia, but not due to any pain while lying down. I am told that this is probably due to my mind and body not being as challenged during this recovery period as it normally is. My mood is positive, and except for feeling a little fatigued in the evening, I really do not feel much different than before surgery. I intend to start driving at 4-weeks post surgery. My biggest current challenge is remembering to take my heart pillow with me, as I forget that I am recovering from heart surgery.
I am an executive coach, which poses no physical demands, so I was able to partially resume working with my clients by phone just two weeks post op. Now, with my driving resuming, I will be fully capable of again meeting clients in person.
I hope that this note encourages those anticipating open-heart surgery, while not too discouraging those who are not as fortunate as me. If anyone would like to privately learn further about my experience, or has specific questions about choices I made to facilitate my recovery, you can contact me through this site and I will provide my e-mail address.
I was asymptomatic at the time of my surgery, and in pretty good physical condition, and guess that contributed to my positive post-surgery experience. Even so, I am motivated to offer my experience to offset some of the horror stories that I had come across in my research prior to my surgery. First, I experienced no post operative pain other than when I coughed, and that was easily treated with pain killers. I was completely off pain killers 3-weeks after surgery. I did have a few incidences of a very bad taste in my mouth for one day in the hospital, and a few days after arriving home, but cutting down on one of my medications resolved that This bad taste, which was very discomforting, is the worst of the effects i felt post surgery.
Second, 10-days post surgery, I was able to walk on a treadmill for 75-minutes at a time at an average speed of 3 mph with a few 5-minute "sprints" of 3.5 and 4.0 mph during the walk. My surgeon had said that I could not work my heart too hard during my recovery, and the cardiac rehab nurse at the hospital said that if I made sure to back off on my speed during exercise whenever I would start to experience breathlessness, I really could safely exercise without being monitored. My cardiologist has since told me that he would have liked to see me ramp up my exercise more slowly, and does want me to enter a cardiac rehab program so I can be monitored for a while. This may be because I experienced some minor afibrillation while in the hospital, and I am just now coming off the medication that was used to treat it. In the meantime, I have backed off to walking daily for only 45-minutes at an average speed to 3.3 mph, compared to my pre-surgery average speed of 3.8 mph.
I have some insomnia, but not due to any pain while lying down. I am told that this is probably due to my mind and body not being as challenged during this recovery period as it normally is. My mood is positive, and except for feeling a little fatigued in the evening, I really do not feel much different than before surgery. I intend to start driving at 4-weeks post surgery. My biggest current challenge is remembering to take my heart pillow with me, as I forget that I am recovering from heart surgery.
I am an executive coach, which poses no physical demands, so I was able to partially resume working with my clients by phone just two weeks post op. Now, with my driving resuming, I will be fully capable of again meeting clients in person.
I hope that this note encourages those anticipating open-heart surgery, while not too discouraging those who are not as fortunate as me. If anyone would like to privately learn further about my experience, or has specific questions about choices I made to facilitate my recovery, you can contact me through this site and I will provide my e-mail address.
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