Continued Drainage 4 week after surgery

Hi,

Wife had bilateral mastectomy with reconstruction ( tissue
expanders). She came down with staph and had both expanders removed.
However, it has been 4 weeks since the last surgery and she still has
some drainage (2" round on pad every 12 hours) from the infected
breast. Culture showed no infection, it is lymph fluid. Plastic
surgeon says wound will close up. We are worried that wound will need
to be re-stitched. Any opinions or personal experience?

Worried

makitso@gmail.com wrote:
> Hi,
>
> Wife had bilateral mastectomy with reconstruction ( tissue
> expanders). She came down with staph and had both expanders removed.
> However, it has been 4 weeks since the last surgery and she still has
> some drainage (2" round on pad every 12 hours) from the infected
> breast. Culture showed no infection, it is lymph fluid. Plastic
> surgeon says wound will close up. We are worried that wound will need
> to be re-stitched. Any opinions or personal experience?
>
> Worried
>

Plastic surgeon probably knows what he is talking about.
I have heard of similar cases that sorted themselves out OK in time.
Usually just around they time they were beginning to get worried.


Tim Jackson

On Sun, 24 Jun 2007 06:40:52 -0700, makitso@gmail.com wrote:

>Wife had bilateral mastectomy with reconstruction ( tissue
>expanders). She came down with staph and had both expanders removed.
>However, it has been 4 weeks since the last surgery and she still has
>some drainage (2" round on pad every 12 hours) from the infected
>breast. Culture showed no infection, it is lymph fluid. Plastic
>surgeon says wound will close up. We are worried that wound will need
>to be re-stitched. Any opinions or personal experience?
>
I had a single mastectomy almost 2 years ago and it took a long time for
the wound to drain.

Since there's no infection, and she's had what amounts to 2 operations,
I wouldn't worry about it yet, just make absolutely sure that it's
dressed regularly with sterile dressings.

My would didn't need to be restitched, even after it was opened up to
scrape out abscess material.
--
"It's easier to get forgiveness than permission."
Rear Admiral "Amazing" Grace Hopper

<makitso@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1182692452.452441.205960@n60g2000hse.googlegr oups.com...
> Hi,
>
> Wife had bilateral mastectomy with reconstruction ( tissue
> expanders). She came down with staph and had both expanders removed.
> However, it has been 4 weeks since the last surgery and she still has
> some drainage (2" round on pad every 12 hours) from the infected
> breast. Culture showed no infection, it is lymph fluid. Plastic
> surgeon says wound will close up. We are worried that wound will need
> to be re-stitched. Any opinions or personal experience?
------------------
I had 2 separate operations, first the mastectomy, then a year later the
reconstruction with tissue expander. (I had to wait a year because I needed
radiation after the mastectomy.) Both times it took over TWO MONTHS to stop
draining. Nothing was wrong, it's longer than usual but not considered
abnormal. It was *annoying* as hell, though, I'll tell you that!

Eva