Hopefully the photo explains what I mean. I got the collar from a chiropractor but I’m sure they are available online.
I believe it’s a standard 24 hours of antibiotics. There was nothing said about any complications, I’m sure it would have been for much longer if there had been.
So, because my surgery was so late on the Friday, I had to stay longer on the Saturday to have my final antibiotic treatment 24 hours after surgery. This meant I didn’t end up discharged until 1600 on Saturday. They didn’t seem at all concerned about timings of my leaving. The drain was removed around 1100 hours too instead of 0600 like they originally had planned. I guess if your surgery is early on Friday morning you may end up leaving on Saturday morning, but don’t count on it. As far as I am aware there is no additional charge for later discharge. They even tried to take my evening meal order as I was leaving!
Can you get there for 0630 with the train then? Yes there is a layby on Grosvenor place giving you 2 minutes drop off. Otherwise hourly rate on street parking is possible in the surrounding streets. I found Eaton place to be easiest as most other streets were residents only. We found a private carpark for our 48 hours stay though which was very easy to use and secure. Ebury street parking I think it was called. £22.50 with a discount code per 24hrs.
Sorry @Warrick you must be getting fed up of questions! Last one I think… how often did they give you the antibiotics (still more anxious about that than the actual surgery clearly) lol
Thanks, that collar looks useful, will see what I can find.
I cannot get there for 6.30 but cannot stay overnight in a hotel due to another health condition (mcas). Most buildings cause severe immune reactions.
So because of this I am checking in at 10am, which is the earliest I can get there from North Yorkshire. They said I am quite far down on the list for surgery and this will be fine. So I guess I may not be checking out at 11 either then. This could get complicated with hubby driving down from Yorkshire, especially as he was planning on leaving our youngest kids at home. They are 17 and 11 but they do fight sometimes and best not to leave them if we’ll be 5 hours longer than expected
Maybe he should bring them too and they can explore London for a few hours. Will figure something out!
I will ask about all this stuff at my pre op appointment anyway. But maybe that parking will be useful if we only get 2 mins drop off time - thanks for that!
Plan your route carefully though, I don’t know how it all works but the hospital is just outside the congestion charge zone, so make sure you don’t stray into that area! Worth checking the map first!
Ha! Yes, knowing our luck hubby might get stuck in a one way sustem and stray into the congestion zone by mistake. Driving in Leeds is bad enough - I suspect London might be stressful!
Thanks so much for the parking info
Can’t imagine having the stress of driving to London too, it’s such a shame that it’s the best place to get the surgery! I can sympathise with the fighting children
Thanks so much. Had my pre op appointment today. I am glad I got to do a trial run actually because even just finding the right bus stop took ages! (I am reluctant to use the underground due to mast cell activation triggers).
Sorry you are feeling so rubbish, but glad that you will soon be fixed!
@Jacqui How was the pre op? Apart from bloods, what did they do? I have mine on Tuesday. I’m so excited at the hope of even feeling a bit better than I’m able to totally ignore all the horrible surgery stuff. I’ve been literally counting the days since I booked in 5 weeks ago. I just hope I’m not disappointed. Good luck tomorrow and let us know how it went (when you’re up to it). You’ve got this!
They did an ECG because of my Hashimoto’s.
Asked about my medical conditions and previous general anaesthetics. Talked about triggers for my mcas and I asked a few questions.
They had a good selection of herbal teas in the waiting room (which I took as a good sign ) and the phlebotomist was fantastic and I didn’t even feel the needle go in, which was a lovely surprise since many nurses are really bad at it!
@Jacqui That’s great, thanks for the info! I suspect they’ll do an ECG on me when they know about my Bradycardia. My resting HR is about 45bpm and always gets picked up when I have surgery. Reassuring re the bloods too. My last A&E trip they bruised my arms trying to get bloods (4th attempt)! I did ask his secretary the other day re medical records being transferred from my GP and apparently they don’t. I think because JH hasn’t asked for a CT contrast from me, I’m a bit anxious he’s just going in! Tbh my styloids look pretty massive, so he probably won’t have much trouble.
@BabzieAM , not everyone has a CT with contrast, and tbh we’ve often had members say that when the doctors operated things were different to how they appeared on the CT (more or less compression, longer styloids, nerves in the way, compression by nerves or muscles rather than the styloids etc!), so I’m sure he’ll find out when he gets in what the situation is! Sending you hugs, the waiting when you feel rough is awful… @Jacqui hope all goes well for you tomorrow, will be praying
@Jacqui & @BabzieAM - Very exciting that your surgeries are so soon! Please remember that you may not get immediate relief of your symptoms. It may take a couple of months after surgery before you really start feeling better. It’s critical not to worry early on if there are only small improvements. Worry delays healing. Be as optimistic as possible.
