Today we had two significant operations. One was a paraesophageal hernia repair. I didn't really know what it was until I looked it up last week, but if you are curious about what a laparoscopic procedure looks like - check out Youtube. That one took a while as it was on a large patient. I spend 2 hours trying to stand still holding the liver out of the way for them to be able to see what they were doing in there. Later, I got to help suture a drain in place and close one of the wounds. I'm moving up in the world and was even praised for the good job I did. Not moving in order to keep things in position is pretty important and requires self-discipline and endurance. I might be sore later. I knew surgery would be taxing, but I wish I could have prepared more for it. I'm still working on getting in shape.
Our first case didn't start on time because we were waiting for our anesthesiologist and it took longer than expected so that meant we continued working through lunch to do the next procedure (subsequently delayed) which was a reversal of a colostomy. During that, I was holding a retractor most of the time and I had the honor of stapling the incision closed and cutting the end ties off a few stitches. Cool stuff. At the end of one of the procedures, we had a minor scare that required a bit of a workup to make sure everything was ok. This is why we have monitors to alert us to potential problems. Part of me was wishing it would be the worst case scenario to see them fix it, but the other part of me was of course hoping that it wasn't a big deal for the patient. In the end it wasn't anything major to worry about. We'll follow up with them down the road. It's great seeing cases from start to finish - getting the whole scope of what is going on and what to do about it.
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