Post ablation

[TomTomorrow]

Had my ablation last Tuesday at Kaiser Hospital Santa Clara CA. Everything went well; they ablated both pulmonary veins, also found and ablated other electrical signals on the roof of my left atrium and a few spots in my right atrium. Felt OK coming out of anesthesia, though had to lie flat on my back without moving for 6 hours. Only problem was the Foley catheter that I had during the procedure and through the night. When they removed it, I couldn't urinate. (I've also got an enlarged prostate, which doesn't help matters.) After drinking lots of water and walking around for a couple hours, I still couldn't urinate, so back in went the catheter (without anesthesia this time--ouch!). I've been on it almost a week now; supposed to get it removed on Wednesday, but today, late in the day, I started bleeding (urine in bag is pink for the last few hours), so the internet says I'm supposed to call the doctor. I had a little blood yesterday, then it went away, so I'm going to wait till morning at least and see what happens. Bums me out, though it's about the least bad thing that could have happened with the procedure.

[BobD Volunteer]

Sorry to hear about your catheter problem. I had similar after my prostatectomy and had to have my bladder emptied with a needle as they then could not get a new catheter in. Eventually cystoscopy showed no blockages so diagnosed muscle spasm. The blood needs checking ASAP by cystoscopy in my view so don't delay.

Good news on the ablation but do rest a lot and read our fact sheet on Recovering from Ablation.

[TomTomorrow in reply to BobD]

Thanks, Bob. My bleeding actually stopped right after I wrote that post--the power of chat room posting, apparently! No bleeding during the night, so I got the catheter out today. Just had my first normal urination, though I have to go back for an ultrasound this afternoon to be sure my bladder is emptying.

[BobD Volunteer in reply to TomTomorrow]

Great. Hope all is well now.

[TomTomorrow in reply to BobD]

Well, things haven't gone as well as I'd hoped. When I went back for my ultrasound after the catheter was removed, I was still retaining a lot of urine, so they put me on "self-catheterization," which I've never heard of. At least I don't have tubes and bags any more, but twice a day I have to urinate as much as I can, then thread in a 16" long catheter and catch the urine to measure how much is left in my bladder. I'll have to keep doing that until it's less than 100 ml three times in a row.

But not to complain too much: the ablation seems to have done the job--NSR and normal blood pressure, feeling genarally better and better.

[BobD Volunteer in reply to TomTomorrow]

Oh lucky you ! I used to pee round my catheter which got messy some times! It all takes time but I'm sure it will be OK in the end. Courage mon ami.

[HiloHairy in reply to TomTomorrow]

I'm a patient at Kaiser Hawaii and am curious who did your ablation. Our electrocardiologist, a Dr. Shah (which I may be misspelling) moved to your region recently. I liked and trusted him and had hoped he would do my ablation. However, he left before he could.

I feel bad for you that you've gone through so much but to be solidly in a sinus rhythm would be a wonderful thing.