I saw my orthopedist today and he reviewed the results of the EMG test from last week and although the nerve will take some time to heal, slowing the healing process of the shoulder, he does not want to wait to do the surgery on the shoulder since the longer we wait the worse the shoulder could get, so I'm going to have the surgery very soon.
I go for pre-admission testing down at Methodist Hospital in South Philly next Friday, the 16th at 8am, and then the surgery itself is scheduled for Friday, September 22nd, two weeks from tomorrow.
This surgery is usually done on an out-patient basis, but he wants to keep me over night to be sure I don't develop and infection and to have a physical therapist show me the new PT exercises the day after the surgery, as well as control my immediate pain while there (and hopefully afterwards). So I'll be in the hospital on the 22nd & 23rd, assuming all goes well.
He warned, as the nerve doctor did, that recovery will be slow and painful, taking 6-9 months (possibly more for full motion) but at the very least all the PT I'll be doing from the 23rd onward will be towards getting my arm back and (eventually) losing the pain. Everything up unitl now (since June 3rd) was to keep the arm from freezing up, making recovery harder.
So it could be until March or May (or beyond) of 2006 until I'm "normal" again...all this from a stupid 2-foot fall into my TV...sigh.
RobMac
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