[Magdalen] Shunt Surgery

[Marion Thompson]

Prayers and good wishes, indeed, as you both deal with the stresses and 
strains of this situation, and more prayers for Lisa's quick and 
complete recovery from the procedure.  And a hearty bravo to you for 
your continuing abstinence.

Marion, a pilgrim


On 12/4/2017 9:01 AM, Christopher Hart wrote:
> Dear Pub Friends,
>
> My wife, Lisa, was born with hydrocephalus and has had since childhood a
> shunt to relieve the excess fluid in her brain. Like many medical devices
> shunts can and do wear out and time also finds the medical community making
> improvements in treatment. About three weeks ago her neurosurgeon placed a
> new type of programmable valve into her existing shunt to enable better
> control of her fluid which was draining too much. This sort of valve did
> not exist when she had her last shunt implanted. The valve was placed into
> her abdomen near a rib to avoid surgery at or near her head. Unfortunately,
> it became disconnected from the tubing and she was leaking cerebro-spinal
> fluid through the incision at an alarming rate. I took her to the emergency
> room yesterday when I suspected what was happening and the neurosurgeon who
> examined her (her surgeon's associate) confirmed my layman's suspicion.
>
> ​The upshot of this is that she now has her shunt connected to an external
> ventricular device to control and monitor the flow and will be ​having a
> whole new shunt installed tomorrow if all goes as planned. This is pretty
> major surgery, but she has a very good surgeon so we have high hopes for
> the outcome. If all is well she may come home as soon as Wednesday, but
> will no doubt have a significant period of recovery to follow. Your prayers
> and good wishes are, of course, welcome and desired, both for her and for
> me as I deal with everything. After eleven hours in or around the ER and
> then ICU (following transfer from one hospital to another) I'm happy to say
> that I did not reach for a drink which certainly would have been my default
> action in the past.