Zack Rippy

For those of you who were not aware, yesterday was Taylor’s eye muscle surgery. The actual procedure was scheduled for around 9:00 AM and we had to be there by 8:00. We were running a little late but made it there around five after. I registered Taylor, signed a few required forms and waited for the nurse to call us to the back. The operation was taking place in Birmingham at Children’s South Pediatric Outpatient Center. This place was absolutely fabulous. Both the facility and the staff were top-notch. The entire place is designed for children - from a whimsical cow that stands in the entry way as you walk in to the life-sized, lighted handprints (pointing up or down) on the outside of the elevators that are perfect for kids like Taylor who always want to push the buttons. The optometry area is on the second floor. The waiting area is occupied by several toys and a large, plastic playset that you would normally see in a backyard. Taylor played on that for about twenty minutes until we were called back.

Once we got to the back, the nurse asked a few brief questions and provided us with a hospital gown for Taylor. It was exactly like the gowns an adult patient would receive, only smaller. Once that was through, we were shown the “sub-waiting” area, as it was designated by the signs. This place was great. There were large plastic cars that the kids could get in and ride around through the hallways. Speaking of the hallways, they were adorned with Disney and Pixar faces, Dora the Explorer and assorted other characters. They also had faux speed limit signs, telling the kids to keep the speed in their cars down. There was a room with probably fiftly different cartoons and children’s movies available, as well as an abundance of toys. There was even a snack room for the immediate family members of patients that had complimentary chips, snacks, coffee, juice and a fountain drink machine. They don’t know what kind of mistake they made having a free Dr. Pepper fountain machine available for me.

Around 8:45, the anesthesiologist came in and explained the procedure to us, along with what to expect. She was followed shortly thereafter by Dr. Cogen, who would actually be performing the surgery. He gave us his rundown as well. Basically, Taylor would go to sleep by a gas mask, with his choice of flavored gas. Once he was sleeping, an IV would be inserted to maintain the anesthesia. The entire surgery was expected to take around an hour, followed by thirty minutes or so of the staff observing him to be sure he came out of anesthesia as expected. Following that, he was to be wheeled back to us, we would wait a little longer and then go home. His eyes would be red and swollen and he would be a bit nauseated, but other than that, perfectly normal.

Around 9:05, they came to get him. We walked with him down to the big double doors leading to the operating rooms. A very nice nurse took him from there and she was talking to him and put him right at ease. We could see that all the hallways in the operating areas were just as “kid-friendly” as the rest of the place.

We waited around in the waiting room until about 9:50, when one of the nurses called us to let us know that everything had gone great and that they were just wrapping up. At about 10:05 or so, Dr. Cogen came down and told us that the surgery had gone perfectly. He told us to expect his eyes to look pretty bloody most of the day and to not be surprised if he was nauseated or threw up. He explained that the eye muscles on which he operated are closely tied to his sense of balance, nausea is a normal side effect. However, after the day was over, we should expect him to be pretty much back to normal. He instructed us to have him keep wearing his glasses until his follow-up appointment next week, when he will give Taylor a much weaker prescription. Essentially, the surgery physically corrects the eyes to the point that the glasses are then able to take over and correct them the rest of the way. For example, if his eyes were 45% off and up to 15% could be corrected with glasses, then they would operate to remove 30% of the problem, allowing glasses to correct the final 15%. The reason that they do not correct the entire 45% is that the body will often over-correct, leading to the same problem in the opposite direction.

At around 10:25 or so, they wheeled Taylor into the room with us. He was asleep on his hospital bed. After about thirty minutes, the nurse came back and started to wake him so that we could dress him and so that she could remove the IV from his arm. He was very groggy and his eyes were red, but he seemed great. He kept his eyes closed for the most part, because they were sensitive to the light. He quickly downed some apple juice, because he had not eaten since the night before and had not drank anything for about six hours. As we were leaving and as we drove him, he was a little nauseated and threw up a bit, but after an hour or so, that stopped and he seemed just fine, albeit very groggy.

Throughout the rest of the day, he was uncomfortable and kind of upset on and off. The doctor said that his eyes might feel like they had sand in them, which cannot feel good at all. By late afternoon though, he seemed almost normal and wanted to play with his toys and go outside. He was still a bit “drugged” acting from time-to-time and was obviously uncomfortable, but overall, he is doing very well.

Marie and I are very grateful to all of you for your prayers for Taylor. It means more than we could ever express.

Note: I will update this post with pictures as soon as soon as I get them.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 29th, 2006 at 5:48 am and is filed under In My Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.