Monday's Doctor Visit

Went for a check up at the doc's today. Saw the physician's assistant (PA), and she checked my scar, tested my fingers, and checked my range of motion. She called the doc in to double check things too, and I've got good range of motion for this stage after surgery (can make a fist and extend my fingers out too).

There was a little more swelling around the incision point than they'd like, so I now have a compression bandage on it under the brace.

Now I just need to keep up with what I've been doing exercise wise and I go back in two weeks time for another check up.

RS Update, KD History

Well, it's been a week since the surgery and here's the current state of play. I'm getting the wound wet when showering and per the doc's advice, doing some exercises with the warm water hitting my wrist - it actually feels really nice, and the wrist is freeing up (this is being typed with 1.5 hands!)

Still wearing the brace at all times outside of showering.

Oh, and as I didn't explicitly state it, no oral pain medication since last Sunday lunchtime and no medication at all since the pain buster was removed Monday afternoon.

I've had a couple of fellow KD sufferers suggest I stick some of my KD history in here too, so here goes.

Back in April, I noticed that my wrist would ache a little. At first I thought I'd just sprained it or something (I did mountain bike three times a week), but it got progressively worse over the course of the next few months, so that by the time July came around, I felt the need to get it checked out.

I have HMO medical, so went to see my Primary Care Physician (PCP). She checked it out and guessed it was tendonitis and gave me a lightweight (comapred to the current one!) wrist brace. but took an x-ray just in case as my pain wasn't classic tendonitis.

She called me a couple of days later to say the x-ray showed a fracture, and she was going to refer me to a wrist specialist. I go see the wrist specialist a week or two later, and see the doc's assistant, who does range of motion and grip tests etc., and does a bunch more x-rays. She immediately says I should get an MRI.

Once the insurance agrees on the MRI, I go get that and then a couple of weeks later again, I go back to the assistant who tells me I have KD (on the MRI, the lunate was black), stage 2.

She explains all the possibilities and consults with the doc and I'm a prime candidate for RS.

I go away to think about it, read up about it, find the KD group on the Internet etc. One of my wife's friends knows someone who has KD and had RS, so he calls me too and explains what he went through. After all these different avenues, it looks like RS is the best way for me to go, so I meet with the doc a couple more times, get it scheduled and approved by the insurance etc., which led me to 10/13.

Doctor Visit - Complete With Scar Photo!!

Yes, you have been warned - scar photo ahead.

I went to see the doc yesterday so he could check out the surgery 3 days after it was done.

First thing that happend was he took the dressing off and removed the pain buster catheter - which was about 4 inches inside my arm, but didn't hurt at all as it was removed. You can vaguely see the hole it left in the scar photo below.

Then the ends of the stitching were snipped off and I was told that the rest will disolve (yipee, second time I'vd had stitches, second time they will disolve away and not have to be removed).

Next was the x-ray machine and my chance to snap a scar photo. Some people are iffy about seeing scar photos, others (particularly Amy!) were very keen on it, so here it is!


In the motorcycle world, it is often quoted that "Chicks dig scars" - not sure if it's a true axiom or just some macho silver lining type thing - so do chicks dig scars?

Anyway, on to the x-rays. The doc took a few and let me have copies of a couple of them, presented below. He took 4.2 mm out of my radius bone (yes, they can be that accurate!), and you can only just see where the cut is (I highlighted it with arrows - it's on a diagonal).


I have a plate and seven screws holding the bone together while it heals - barring some disaster, they'll remain in there for ever - and should not set off airport metal detectors (the wand might be a different story!)


He checked everything and it's all looking good. I'm now in a heavy duty wrist brace and will be for the next few weeks - though in a couple of days I'll be able to remove it to shower and get the wound wet.

I have exercises to do to regain mobility and I'm back at the doc's in a week's time.

RS Surgery Done - The Longer Version

Here's a longer update (now with photos).

Before I went to the hospital on Friday, I took a photo of my arm pre-surgery.

After I got to the hospital, it was the normal waiting around stuff. Eventually, I was down in the pre-op area beng fitted for an IV. I could hear someone else in there talking with their doc and it was apparent that they had had many surgeries and suffered through many forms of cancer, so it was a salient reminder that even though I'm about to have surgery, I'm very lucky.

I remember going into the operating theater and my arms being being spread out like Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man. My left arm had the IV in it and the right arm was on an x-ray table. Then I started to feel drowsy and awoke in the recovery room.

The next few hours are rather hazy - saw some of the MLB game on the TV, kept dozing off, had some bland soup, decided to stay in the hospital overnight (way too loopy to do anything else). Yuan went home for the night.

I was taken off the pain IV around midnight (had some jello too - it tasted awesome) and had a pain pill instead - had another at 4am with a popsicle and started to feel better soon after the IV was stopped.

Yuan came back in the morning and we left and came home.

I have a pain buster in my arm - seems to be a new thing as most nurses at the hospital had only heard of them before (never seen one), so we had to have a photo session of the arm with the pain buster in it.

The pain pills were still making me a little loopy, so stopped taking them Sunday lunchtime and started feeling better again.

A doc visit this afternoon is next.

RS Surgery Done

This is a quick one handed entry to say I had the 3+ hour surgery on Fri 13th an spent the night in the hospital (too loopy to go home).

Home now in mild discomfort and a "pain buster" wired into my arm hanging off my t-shirt.

More details and pictures to follow.

Kienbock Countdown - Friday the 13th

Kienbock's Disease (KD) - it's not a disease. How did it ever get to be called a disease?, I have no idea.

Anyway, I have this condition and I'm having radius shortening surgery on Friday the 13th of October.

The plan is to document how it goes on this very web site - an event so exciting, it might even generate a comment.

A bit of context - KD is a condition where blood supply is lost to the lunate bone in the wrist and various bad things happen as a consequence.


My lunate has lost its blood supply and has a fracture.

The typical solution is to do a radius shortening to redistribute the load within the wrist so there is no pain. 6 months after surgery, I should be able to go mountain biking again.

So, if you're unfortunate enough to have KD too, or are supremely bored, stay tuned for updates....