While I have perused "the other board" it has been mentioned a couple of times that some surgeons are "gentler" than others ...which may result in less post-op pain. Do you think there is much to this? Is there really that much difference in not necessarily "skill" but in how a person is "handled" surgically?

I don't know about surgeons being gentler than others but the skill of the anaesthetist is a huge factor where immediate post op pain is concerned. I have had the same surgeon for several ops and different anaesthetists each time and the level of pain has differed, although that could also be that the surgery conducted was different as well and the surgeon may have been a bit rougher....

Humm interesting.

My hope would be all surgeons are mindful of patients "parts" so as to not cause needless discomfort after surgery. I think some doctors are cheap with the pain medication after surgery. This may be more to blame than being gentle or not.

I was a dental assistant for awhile. A job I loved but doctors are so hard to work for. Anyway one time a patient was numb and I accidently squished her numb lip between my evacuator (sucky thing) and her teeth. She of course didn't feel it right then but she had a little cut and we had to tell her. She was not upset but I felt terrible for days about it and it was just a small cut. I hope that all medical pros are like this.

Unfortunately they are not. Sometimes when a person does things that are becoming routine, they just dont take the same kind of care or hesitancy that others do. Many things can factor into this, ie. length of the surgery, time of day, how rushed they might be etc. I am not saying every doctor is like that. I saying it can happen and does. Thankfully my surgeon and anethesiologist were among the more caring professionals.

I think that may be a true statement when I hear people saying they "only" took pain medication for 3 or 4 days or it was the worse pain they've ever had ... the only time I had pain medication was the day of surgery and I never needed it after that; so maybe it was because Dr. Aceves and his staff were "kinder" "gentler" surgeons ... I don't know for sure. I do know I'm glad I didn't have to take anymore pain medication than I did.

I think so. Both the anesthesiologist, and the surgeon work together as a team to limit the pain of the patient.

Good pain management encompasses so many things... timely use of drugs, the right kind of drugs, a multi layered approach, also things like caring, Dr. visits, positive people around, responsiveness of the staff, etc.

But good surgical technique can also limit pain for sure.

I am sure some surgeons are gentler than others. I think with mastery comes gentleness. In addition, I think that for certain doctors like Dr. Aceves it is kind of a methodological philosophy. That's a wise approach. I imagine people heal more quickly because of it.

As to anesthesia, my anesthesiologist, Dr. Andreas Garcia, was spectacular. He essentially offered me a choice between traditional sedation versus an epidural numbing. As a consequence of my choice -epi- wooziness, nausea, head-ache, things that are associated with sedative anesthesia, were absent.

I don't it's necessarily that they are gentle the way we think of it. But some surgeons definitely have better technique than others and some take care to line things up properly so there are less complications, etc. You have to figure that less cutting and less stitching and more effective stitching (i.e., not having to go back and repair parts) are going to make healing go faster.

Pain is subjective so I don't think you can necessarily tell a surgeon's skill by how long people are on pain meds. Some people really feel everything, some people want to be as comfortable as possible while others will tough it out. Also, having a hiatal hernia repaired gives some people killer back pain.

Thank God I didn't have the back pain too - the spasming is bad enought thank you very much!

I had it pretty bad and my surgeon warned me that I would and said he was sorry.

But I don't think it's because he's "rough" because I'm 10.5 months out and I *still* have issues with back pain there. I once tore a calf muscle and it took TWO YEARS to not feel it when I went on a long car drive. My hiatal hernia repair is behaving similarly. When I workout intensely, it hurts when I drive home.

But I have seen videos where surgeons are yanking and pulling and pinching. That's rough. I'm sure it doesn't help. But most of the "trauma" is from stapling and cutting and a machine does that and does it pretty uniformly. :biggrin: