Recovery from Fundoplication

This is in reply to Jesse’s question about recovering from fundoplication…

The gastroenterologist told me that the surgery is done laparoscopically through five small abdominal incisions.  One of those is through the belly button.  I’m going to ask my surgeon if indeed it is the belly button because when I had pelvic laparoscopy done before and they went through my belly button, it took forever to heal and was very painful.

The gastroenterologist and surgeon both said that the surgery is more involved than an appendectomy, but much less involved than a hysterectomy (of which I had the full abdominal version last year and had an extremely easy recovery).  They said I’ll be in the hospital overnight and unable to work the day of and day after surgery.  Since I work in IT and am mostly sitting in front of a computer all day, I’ll be able to go back “to work” the day after I get home.  “To work” means that I’ll be required to not drive for a week, and I’ll have to work from my home computer, which is easy for me to do.  I also won’t be short on help, as I work for the hospital where I will be having the surgery.

Jesse’s Manometry Test

Hi, Jesse, thanks for writing.   I hope I can help.  I find that I feel better if I don’t eat too late in the evening and if I eat several small meals througout the day.  Nighttime eating can help cause backup into your esophagus when you lie down to go to sleep.  You can also try sleeping with the top part of your body elevated on a bed wedge or a few pillows.  You need gravity to help keep things down there.

As for time — I had an RN who did the actual manometry test, and she sent the data to a physician who does the interpretation who then sends that report to the physician who ordered the test.  My gastroenterologist had his report and recommendations ready for me the next day.

My endoscopy (tube down the throat) didn’t show anything except a small hiatal hernia.  It could be that the medication I keep taking was helping prevent esophagus damage.

On the other hand, my manometry test (tube down the nose and into the stomach) showed that my lower esophageal sphincter is weak, and that’s the main reason I have the reflux.  Because of this result, my gastroenterologist referred me to a general surgeon, and that surgeon is now requiring that I have a barium swallow test.  After that, I should be ready for surgery.  The surgery is called Nissen Fundoplication, and what they do is wrap the upper part of the stomach around the lower part of the esophagus to give a stronger sphincter.  The success rate of the surgery is around 94%, even after ten years.  Right now, I’m taking medication that is very expensive and is not doing a very good job of helping, so I’m ready to go through the surgery and get to feeling better.

I hate to break it to you, but the manometry test is awful.  If you have sinus troubles, you might want to take a decongestant or something over the country to try to get your nose as open as possible.  I was also choking and coughing when the tube first went down.  They can’t sedate you for the test because you have to be able to swallow salt water and thin gel during the test.

Best wishes to you!

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s what Jesse asked: 

I just needed to add that.. this thing, this itch, or pain usually comes after i eat.. but not always.. but sometimes at night its impossible for me to sleep.. its like torture :/ and how long does it take for a manometry result? sometimes i feel i cant hold it any longer.. From esophagus test — fascinating, but don’t want to be the nurse who does it!, 2008/05/11 at 9:12 PM	2008/05/11	Approve | Unapprove | Spam | Delete
	Jesse drumahfoo@hotmail.com | 66.68.233.181 They are doing that Manometry test on me tomorrow… ive been feeling chest pain, but could indentify the source when i swallow in my esophagus, ive had 2 endoscopies and neither showed anything bad.. but i keep feeling this nausea, mostly gag from the pain or feeling like theres something stuck in my lower esophagus, like this itch that doesn’t go away.. Anyway, what kind of surgery cures a weak esophagal sphincter?

esophagus test — fascinating, but don’t want to be the nurse who does it!

Due to a gastrointestinal issue, I had an esophageal manometry test last week to see how well my esophagus pushes fluid and gel from my mouth to my stomach.  This was one of the most unpleasant tests I’ve ever had in my life, but it was still fascinating to watch.  I was sitting up, and the nurse coated a two foot tube with local anesthetic.  She then pushed this tube down my nose.  My sinuses are chronically swollen, so this was difficult.  She tried the left, then the right, then decided the left was better.  It hurt like crazy to have that thing forced all the way down into my stomach, and I gagged and coughed, and gagged some more.  Once I got through that, I turned my head to see what the nurse was watching on her screen. 

She had at least fifteen touchscreen buttons, and lots of numbers and bars that were measuring where in the esophagus the various sensors on that tube were located, and they were measuring how strongly my esophagus was handling the saline (salt water) she was squirting in my mouth and having me swallow.  I had to do ten swallows of saline and ten swallows of a yucky gel that was the consistency of watery gelatin.  Each swallow resulted in several calculations from the sensors located along the tube.  The test went on for 45 minutes, particularly because if I swallowed at the “wrong” time, the timer on the screen had to be restarted.  After all that, the nurse gently pulled out the tube, and it hurt almost as bad coming out as going in. 

Can you imagine how horrible a job it would be to have the job of this nurse — forcing tubes down patients’ throats?  I felt more sorry for the nurse for having had to do that to me than I did having it done to me.  As awful as it was, it was over for good.  She, on the other hand, had to do the same procedure to the patient after me. 

By the way, the result was that my lower esophageal sphincter is weak, and that has led to the recommendation that surgery be done to cure my acid reflux.  More about that to come…

Introduction

I’m a writer and trainer for the electronic charting system used by a large hospital system that encompasses four hospitals and about 6000 employees.  I’m one of only five people who train everyone else in how to use the system.  I hold bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English, and I started my career as a middle school English teacher, then moved into technical writing — mostly with the rental car industry, and then in November 2007 started writing and training for the hospital system.  Science and medicine has always been a strong fascination for me.  Almost all the way through school I aspired to become an astronaut and physician.  However, in college, I learned that I did not have the math ability to pursue medicine.  Although I’m quite young, I’ve had more than my share of health problems, so I’ve seen the good, bad, and ugly from health professionals.  Now that I’m in a hospital environment, some of my fascination is being satisfied, being able to see doctors and nurses at work and doing the job of saving lives.  I now see first hand the struggles of physicians and nurses as they work intensely long hours with extremely ill patients, and I am both humbled and blessed to see the human side of medicine. 

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