Friday, January 18, 2008

Day 3 - the Packing comes out and the air goes in

Day 3 was an expectant day for me. Dr Tan told me that the packing that has remained in my nose for the last 48 hours will come out and that I will feel much better. After breathing through my mouth completely for the last 48 hours, I was literally counting the minutes for the doctor to arrive.

The nurse came at about 6.30am in the morning and call out in a soft voice to me..."Mr Foo, sorry to wake you up from your sweet dreams. I need to prepare you so that Dr Tan could remove the packing from your nose at about 7...". She gave me my change, asked me if I needed help to wash up (...I declined) and told me to push the call bell when I am ready so that she can give an injection of pedadine for some pain relief when the packing are being taken out.

I took a hot shower, careful not to wet my nose and the "nose tampon". The nurse came gave me the injection and within 10 mins I was feeling sleepy from the shot. I was told to lie in bed and not move around by myself... as usual I obeyed...

Dr Tan was busy, so he sent his registrar. The doctor assured me "...I have done this many times, don't worry." I was asked to sit upright and held a tray below my nose. He sorted out the strings that were attached to the packing in my nose to make sure that they do not tangle together as they were being removed. He started with the left nose. He held on to one of the string and with the hand on my nose, he gently pulled out the first packing.

The feeling was very very strange but not painful at all. It is not common to have a piece of sponge like packing about 6-7 cm long slide along the wall of your nose. Frankly, it felt like a very thick of mucous being dragged out from the nose. For the chronic sufferers, you know what a nice feeling that would be. next came one packing from the right nose, then the left and then finally the right again... now all the packings were out, stained with blood and mucous. Then the most amazing thing happened, air gushed into my nostril, my sinuses were filled with air for the first time in many years and my lungs fell open... I thank God for the success of the surgery...my worries were completely wiped away.

The doctor told me to hold the tray below my nose for the next 10 mins as it is common for bleeding to occur when the packings are taken out... but he was wrong because there was none!!

At 11am, I was told that I could go home. My medicine came... a 2 week course of antibiotics (amoxylin), some panadol for pain relieve and if the pain got bad I was given acoxia as well.

The hardest part is now over, all I need to do is to rest and recover...

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