My daughter will be going through major surgery next month, cleft palate repair being the major and also getting tubes in ears, ABR test, larynxoscopy, tracheoscopy, MRI of the brain betting bones and abdomen checked, all in the same day. We have a long day ahead of us. I was wondering if any one has had or knows some one who has had one of these procedures, I know she will be under anesthesia, for a long while. My question mainly goes to the cleft palate repair, Is the recovery very painful? whats your experience with your lil' one with this?
PS. she does have various complications and has had procedures before under anesthesia like when she got her trach and g-tube placed in, but its so worry some everytime she is going to be under! I cant help but worry, and poor thing the recovery will probably b so hard.
Thanks to everyone who has responded to this! she's doing good recovery is hard for her but doing well
Prayer for you and your little one. I do not have experience with cleft palate procedures but I can't imagine the amount of worry you have and I just wanted to let you know that I'll be praying for you and your little girl!
Jan, I have some experience with this. My grandson was born with a cleft lip and palate. He had his first sugery at 2 months old. that was to close/repair the lip. Next surgery was at 1 year old for the first of the cleft palate repairs. He is going in for the next one this summer (he is ten now) his recovery was not horrible. He was pretty much under for the entire first day. after that he was very lethargic for about a week. not sure if that was intentional or just his own coping mechanism. he had to have soft stuff to eat for a while. nothing cruncy no chips, cookies etc. it was stuff like applesauce, and pureed babyfoods (he was only a year so no biggie on that) he will be getting braces after the next surgery as his teeth are a mess all over the place. but he goes to shriners hospital for all the surgeries. they can do so many miraculous things now good luck
My had a cleft palate repair when he was 2 1/2. I can't remember how long surgery was but it felt like forever to us. He was very uncomfortable for the first day. He stayed in the hospital for two nights. He could only eat soft food. When he came home he made a quick recovery and was back on his normal diet in a week. Hope all goes well.
It depends on what exactly he is having done (cleft). My son had the soft palate and the hard palate repair done in separate surgeries due to the severity of his cleft. With the soft palate it was much worse of a recovery, but still done and sent home that day. He had it done at 9 months and had to be off a bottle and pacifier by then. It was a difficult recover. With the hard palate repair he we took him home afterwards and were told to keep him quiet ~ yeah he wanted to wrestle a couple of hours later.
Ear tubes ~ no big deal : )
My son has had 2 cleft surgeries (lip, hard & soft palate), partial adenoidectomy & tubes about 5 times (I think). Sending them to anesthesia does not get any easier. I wish you guys luck and a very speeding recovery to you little girl.
Jan, best of luck to your little one. I don't have experience in the cleft palate department, but my son had 2 open heart surgeries before 6 months old. He needs another one next summer. I know after both of his OHS he was heavily sedated for a while. The first surgery was at 11 days old and he was heavily sedated and medically paralyzed for about 8 days after surgery. The kept him this way for about 48 hours after his second surgery. The surgical nurses can probably answer some of those questions. ((HUGS))
