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Friday, June 20, 2014

Physical therapy for hip labral tear

One of the nice things about my surgery is that I had it done within the Tulane network. I work inside Tulane Medical Center, and everyone has been incredibly concerned and helpful (one of the doctors actually called my cell from out of the country on Friday to check on me!).
Once I had the surgery done, a drove of helpful therapists started calling me or stopping by to see me at the pharmacy. Before I even had an Rx written for PT, one of my favorite physical therapists had set me up with a PT who normally works at sports medicine (Uptown clinic), but comes to the hospital (Downtown) twice a week to work with the Orthopedic clinic patients. He's willing to come in early for me and start my PT at 8 am, so that I can get in 45 minutes and be downstairs opening my pharmacy by 9 am. This is perfect for me, because now I can just get my PT done right where I work, just a few floors up!

Unfortunately, day one of PT had an inauspicious start. I hopped (literally) out of the shower and started getting ready when I realized that there was blood on my deodorant...and my face lotion...and the carpet...I looked down, and one of my incisions (the one that appeared swollen when I posted last) was draining heavily. It wasn't blood; it was bloody discharge. There had been a lot of swelling in that area, so I figured it needed to drain, but I couldn't control it! It was practically squirting out. I soaked through paper towels like nothing - but it wouldn't stop pumping fluids out. Fifteen minutes later, I was going to be late for PT if I didn't leave NOW, so I just started piling bandages and paper towels on top, holding it all in place with spandex shorts, which I layered under running shorts.
By the time I got to my car, blood had soaked through all the bandages and both pairs of shorts.
So I showed up to PT looking like I'd just been shot in the thigh. Luckily, several lovely therapists had me re-wrapped in layers of gauze and Tegaderm in no time, and I was ready to start PT.

Now, the first person to recommend Van Sice to me was a PT at Tulane, who worked with his hips, but she actually moved last month. I'm not going to lie; I was disappointed. The therapist I'm working with instead is brand new. He graduated last month, actually. That's fine, though. I like young, new health care professionals willing to try cutting edge nonsense. And to help him out, I provided him with a protocol from another doctor: Dr. Shane Nho at Rush Medical posts all his documents online, and all of them are extremely helpful. I brought the rehab protocol to Christian, my PT, and he will be working with it as a guide.
If you want more info on hip labral tear surgery, especially the rehab component, I highly recommend browsing Dr. Nho's website - it's full of info.

The PT session went incredibly well, although every time I moved my leg blood pumped gayly out of my wound. I have minimal pain with all movements, and excellent strength on both sides. The only strength score I got that wasn't a 10 was hip extension on the left, which makes sense since I've been prevented from that movement for a week. But my PT cautioned me that weakness could still develop: I'm only 1 week in.

As for the drainage, it was so heavy for so long that I called my doctor. His nurse made me check for warmth, pus, etc , but I had no signs of infection. They recommended Bactrim DS for 7 days, but I actually didn't fill it; the draining stopped by late afternoon and I think it's ok now. Very annoying, though. I easily lost about 6 ounces of fluid. If it continues to drain today, I'll start the antibiotic.



14 comments:

  1. I'm glad you are in the h/c industry and can be calm about the draining--I suppose others wouldn't be! Glad you are on your way.

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  2. Ditto Ririnette's comment!!! You're not typically a blogger who goes into grandiose detail about all your maladies ... thank you! ESPECIALLY since that was as descriptive as any frigging horror movies I've watched! I was wishing it would end, but just kept reading.

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  3. Sorry guys.
    I guess I've been in healthcare for so long that my description seemed quite innocuous to me. I didn't mean to be gross! I could have made it a whole lot more detailed, believe me! I asked David for help at one point, but he got up and left with a grayish face without a word. Ha.

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  4. Better out than in I guess. And it didn't gross me out. Once you've seen a giant abscess drained on a tiny dog and smelled what came out of it, a little bloody description doesn't even phase you.

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  5. Is it a good idea to do PT with that going on? Not going to assume the answer is "yes" simply because you did it ;-)

    Hope it's calmed down!

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    1. Yeah, I think it's cool, one of the other PTs (the one who set up my appointment) is both a PT and a wound care specialist, and he said manipulating it would speed up drainage in a good way. He actually has me lightly massaging the site now to allow it to drain (which it is still doing profusely).

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    2. Does it hurt? Are you supposed to work through the pain since you're skipping the meds? I was. But I'm guessing we're similarly pain-'tolerant' ;-)

      Here's to speedy healing :)

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    3. Honestly, it hasn't hurt yet. But I haven't born any weight on it, so I can't tell. Nothing hurt last time, but the most strenuous thing I did was bridges, so...

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  6. I love the title "How I Complicated My Life Today" I can totally relate! I fee like you and I could swap a lot of good stories. Like you my hobby list is long enough to fill two full time jobs. Good luck Grace with the PT (Been there (many times), done that!)

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    1. Thank you! I told my PT this time around to keep in mind that I'm 40 years younger and twenty times more active than his usual hip patients - so he can give me lots to do. Hopefully that helps.

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  7. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  8. Wow, personal spam comments, that's new.

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