Friday, February 1, 2008

Ow!! That hurts.

Live from Room 5126 Duke University Hospital we bring you a post surgical report.

Surgery went well. the final procedure included wide margin excision of the initial primary site, an initial excision of a 'spot' of interest to th edermatologist, and the removal of a smaller mass that has seen some growth over the past 4 months.

It was the thrid site that presented the surgical challenge of the day, requiring the surgeon to conduct a serial excision of the bottom side, until he thought he was in 'clean' tissue. As he has operated on many patients with nevi, and as he was familiar with the initial findings, his thoughts were that he did not want to come back and have to do a re-excision of this spot in 60 days time.

The size of this third excision coupled with teh wide margin excision of the primary site meant that for a good wound closure, it would require a skin graft. This skin graft was taken from the back of his right thigh and measured ~4 inches x ~9 inches.

Given the length and extent of the surgery, Evan was given plenty of anesthetic and plenty of time to recover later. As he came out of the anesthesia fog he became aware of increased discomfort from the graft site and later the extent of donor site oozing. One intern, and a dressing change later destined us to a night at the Hotel Duke UMC.

Thank you for all your prayers, and we look forward to updating the information later.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Evan and the entire family are in the Prayers of the YOUTH MINISTRY. We hope to see all of you soon. May the PEACE of the LORD be with you <><, john & linda

Unknown said...

The Hughes family in oHIo are praying for each family member. We love you very much!