Monday, March 17, 2014

Bye Bye Fentanyl Patch, Hello Seroma.

We removed the fentanyl pain relief patch yesterday afternoon and soon afterwards Kayla started paying more attention to her wound, probably because she's no longer high on fentanyl which is a narcotic, (member of the same group of drugs to which opium and morphine belong). We caught her scooting on the carpet and a reddish, clear fluid immediately started seeping from her sutures. We went through so many sheets of paper towel and it wouldn't stop draining.

Rawr I'm a dilophosaurus from Jurassic Park!
We knew it was most likely caused from post-surgery seroma (an accumulation of fluid under the skin, most likely caused from over activity after surgery), which our doctors and nurse warned us about. It's pretty common, but we became really worried since it wouldn't stop so we took her to the hospital. The doctor looked at the fluid sample and confirmed that it doesn't look infected (great news), but we must keep her from moving around too much. 

We've been using women's maxi pads to soak up the seroma fluids. Sounds weird, but it works really well! The pads are sterile, super absorbent and has an anti-leak technology that locks in fluid and helps keep the wound dry. They also gave us some sedatives (acepromazine) to keep her from being too active but it made her really out of it and messed with her bowel movement. Still debating whether or not we should continue it.

No more moving around and the cone is going back on puggy...

3 comments:

  1. lol. this post sounds like an advertisement for maxi-pads. Hope Kayla is feeling better!!

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    Replies
    1. Haha someone else said I should write ad copy for maxi pads...

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  2. Also LOL'ing at maxi pads reference here :)

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