Duration of Surgery

[A User Is Me]

My son's surgery would be T4-L3 or L4 posterior fusion with evoked potentials and would last about 3 hours with 2 day hospital stay. His curve is T11-L4 50degree and T5-T11 49 deg. Does anyone have a similar experience? In this forum, most surgeries seem to take much longer than 3 hrs. Is our case rather simpler one (I hope) or under estimation on time. Also what are the chances are with the revision surgery with newer instrumentation.

[LindaRacine]

Hi...

Every case is very different, so it's difficult to say if that's too little time. It does seem rather short. If you haven't already gotten a second opinion, I really would encourage you to do so. Even if there wasn't a concern about the duration of the surgery, it's just good consumerism to get the second opinion. You'll find a list of scoliosis specialists here:

http://www.srs.org/directory/directory.asp

Regards,
Linda

[flowerpower]

My son was fused from T4-L4, posterior surgery. The surgery was completed in about 4 hours. He spent 7 days in hospital.

Renee

[offroad44]

My daughter's spine was fused from T-11 to L-2 her surgery was about 4 hours and she had surgery on wensday and was home on sunday

VINCENT

[lnetzer]

My son was fused from T3 to L4 and we were originally told the OR was booked for 6 hours and to expect that the surgeon would need that entire time. THe surgery ended up being just shy of 12 hours, she did get a better correcting, and we were informed every 2 hours as to what was going on. There were no complications either, so other than the better correction than what she originally thought, we don't know why it took almost 12 hours. Hospital stay was Monday morning and he was released a day early, Friday afternoon. We are all over the moon about the results though. Good luck! It is worth it!!

[Bamaro]

A 2 day hospital stay seems a little short. 4 or 5 days seems to be the norm

[flowerpower]

Hi Laurie!

It' great to hear Josh is doing so well post-surgery. If I remember correctly, he had a bit of a hard time before surgery? It's always nice to hear another success story. Best wishes-

Renee

[HeathersDad]

My daughter was fused from T4 to L3 on a Monday, went home on Saturday. Surgery lasted about 6 hours.

[Christina_in_NC]

13yo dd fused T5-L3 - surgery lasted 3 hours. She could have gone home after 3 nights except that she was still not keeping solid foods down. Without that she would have been home. She felt ready to go home after that 3rd night.

[A User Is Me]

My son was fused from T4-L4, posterior surgery. The surgery was completed in about 4 hours. He spent 7 days in hospital.

Renee
How's your son doing now?
My son is 5,5 and 90lbs. Will his thinness affect the recovery hard?

[flowerpower]

Hi,

My son is doing very well these days. At his 1 yr. check-up everything looked good. Except for an occasional sore back from a long day on his feet, he feels good & hasn't had any complications thus far. Prior to surgery, I made sure he ate as healthy as possible. I feel that helped alot in his recovery. He lost a lot of weight after surgery & it took a while to put it back on.

I don't know that being thin will make recovery any harder for your son. He may feel a bit weak if he loses alot of weight. I would just make sure he eats really healthy, lots of protein and iron. Gaining a few pounds prior to surgery probably wouldn't hurt.

Best wishes,

Renee

[amber24]

My surgery was supposed to be 3-4 hours, but it ended up being 5 hours. My respiratory level went down during surgery. The staff had trouble getting me to wake up and my oxygen level dropped after surgery. I was supposed to be in the hospital for 3-4 days. It ended up being 5 days because my oxygen level would not stay up even after being hooked up to the oxygen machine and my blood pressure kept staying low. I am 24 and I had spinal fusion from T5-L5.