The day I meet my Surgeon!

Wednesday, Sept. 26, 2012 - Week 1

Today, I'm just a nervous wreck! I go in to see the surgeon for the first time. I get to the patient room and am very anxious. I was sent to the cast room. There I saw a bunch of items for casts and a box of fake bones! Then I got more even more nervous!

 

The surgeon comes in and is very nice and very informative with explaining everything he saw on the xray(of the ankle after the ER doctor who popped my dislocated ankle back into place) what had happened to me. Clearly I have a break in my fibula, another angle of another xray of my heel shows it is fractured, and a huge gap on the other side of my ankle shows that I have torn ligaments.

The result is he suggests I need surgery to put in a plate and screws to reattach my fibula which clearly shows it has detached. I start to get really nervous and ask questions. He said it was a no brainer to get the surgery which is called an Ankle ORIF (Open Reduction Internal Fixation) Surgery. If I chose to stay in a cast and not get surgery, he would have to somehow snap my ankle back into place and just cast it which did not sound good at all. So he gave me some time to think about what he just told me and for me to come up with any questions I needed to ask. So I decided with my brother in the room that this was the best decision to go forward and agree with the surgeon to get the surgery done and whatever questions I asked he answered in a very comforting way. He said I am young and will heal better and have even a faster recovery because I am very healthy. It would need to be done within the week he says. So he scheduled the surgery for Friday!

I was given instructions and a pamphlet for the surgery day and had to call in to the hospital to register. He also sent me off to get a blood test to check for any other health issues in case so they are aware of anything in case for surgery day. Thankfully the surgeon and staff were very comforting and nice which made me leave their office not as scared as when I got there.