My DD is 23 and had hip releases and heel cord lengthening when she was about 6. So, it wasn't recent, but it certainly was memorable.
Pain wasn't really an issue for my son. He was a little uncomfortable initially, but within days he wasn't complaining about pain. He did complain about itching though. I gave him benadryl, especially at night because it helped him sleep and relieved his discomfort.
I was also surprised my DD didn't seem to have a lot of pain.
I don't remember using anything for itching other than we used a cool (no heat) hairdryer down her casts a few times.
My son had his heel cords done when he was 4 years old. 2 years later he had heel cord, hamstrings and hip adductors done. He was in full leg casts with a rod holding his legs 19 inches apart. He was in these full legs casts for 8 weeks. It was HORRIBLE. The short leg casts were a walk in the park compared to those long leg casts with the bar.
I remember that.
DD had the full leg casts with the rod (even though we tried to prevent her from doing it, she figured out that the rod made a handy hand hold to help her sit).
Anyway, after about maybe 4-6 weeks, the rod was cut off close to the casts. 2 full leg casts with a rod seemed like a really hard thing to deal with until we had 2 full leg casts without a rod. The casts were constantly either bumping into each other or one leg would get away -
that was not popular - it pulled on her legs and hurt. So, we had to be very careful once the rod was off.
Then, a few weeks later, the doctor cut the casts down to just below the knee. That was better. We still had the casts hitting, but she was much lighter.
Yeah he is just having the heel cords done, we just got the all the hospital info in the mail today and all it said was bilateral heel cord lengthening. My son's pt said she had another patient that just it done by the same doc and was in full leg casts too. So apparently it's what this doc does, Thank you for the benadryl tip, i'll get stocked up now, he's had tylenol3 before and it didn't seem to effect him to much, but he takes miralax daily so we may not have problem there. Thank you for the info it's much appreciated
becca
I know for broken bones, they usually go one joint above the break for stability. I believe they do the same thing for this kind of surgery sometimes.
no, his wasn't done for club feet. He has cerebral palsy and his heel cords were so tight that we could stretch and stretch and still not get the results needed. We tried braces too but he just slipped up in them because of the tightness, so this was the last resort. When we would try to stand him to get weight through his legs he would be on his tip toes and stay that way. Oh he's 3 (will be 4 in november) and this is his 8th surgery to date, so he's getting to be a pro at recovery and he is going back to school tomorrow.
becca
We had the same thing with DD. She had (ugh, it's late and all I can think of is UFOs - obviously not the correct term) brace things. We would just get them on and get them all strapped, then she would move her leg and they would pop right off.
We were lucky that was the only surgery she has had. She is classified as a mixed spastic quad. She varies between a lot of spastic extensor tone and hypotonicity. Because of that, she actually has very little lost range of motion, a little in her knees and hips. They have wanted to do more surgery on her feet because they are kind of deformed, but she is no longer a functional walker because of other issues (like hypotonicity in part of her trunk that made her more unstable as she grew.) So, they really could not give us good reasons for doing her feet - we had one doctor who said she would not be able to wear shoes by the time she was 12. She's still wearing shoes and walks with a gait trainer, so I'm glad we didn't listen to him.
FORGOT TO MENTION: glad to hear he got thru it and seems to be doing well
thank you for asking. How's your son doing?
