Consultation with surgeon
 

I'm having my consultation with my surgeon is there anything I should ask, know or do before this appointment? Now that surgery is approaching so fast it's almost scary, I have 2 small children to worry about and the care of them afterwards!

Any help would be great :)

Kimmy, I just wanted to say that looking through old posts might be helpful. I haven't had a thymectomy, so I can't give you any advice. Surgery is a big deal with MG and, if your MG isn't do great, they often do plasmapheresis or IVIG to make sure you're strong beforehand. They may even do it afterwards.

Surgery is hard to recover from. You can't lift kids for weeks afterwards! Which procedure are you having?

I hope it goes well for you. Call in the cavalry, because you'll need a lot of help in the first few weeks. Take care.

Annie

Hi Kimmy,

Your first question needs to be how is the surgeon planning on doing the operation. Is (s)he going to be using a minimally invasive method or are you looking at a full split sternum surgery? Is your MG well controlled currently (if not, you'll want to ask about plasma pheresis and/or IVIG to get it well controlled before surgery.) Are you going to need to talk to oncology (is there a mass to be concerned about? or is it just for an enlarged and/or hyperplastic thymus?) You're going to want to speak with your anesthesiologist at some point - let them know you have MG and that they need to consider this when they're putting you under.

Your questions really depend on your current situation. And Annie is 100% correct - bring in family & friends to help with the little ones; you'll be out of commission for at least healing time. If it is a minimally invasive method you're looking at a week or two; if a full split sternum you're looking at a month and a bit. Talk to the little ones about it and let them know what is going on. My daughter was 8 when I had my thymectomy, she really did understand that I'd not be able to be carrying her around for a while when I talked to her about it.

If you have any specific questions about what is going on, feel free to shout out.

Best of luck,

Brian.