DS (7) is due to have open heart surgery soon. He had a thoracotomy last year and bounced back pretty quickly. Am hoping this will be the same. Surgery is to remove a tumour that has grown rapidly and is surrounding his aorta. Has anyone got any experience of this? How did your child cope with the surgery? DS is normally fine with a GA and has had several over the years, but am worried about how sore he will be afterwards and how it will restrict him.
The surgeon, who I have complete faith in, was very to the point when we met with him earlier, and glossed over the 5% mortality/ complications risk. We'll get a chance to speak to him before the op again, but am slightly terrified of the implications of operating so close to the heart (and spine).
The surgeon is a top cardiothorasic paediatric specialist, but he is doing the operation under the request of Ds's oncologist and no one can really say anything about outcome other than they will remove as much tumour as possible, get a decent stab at a good biopsy and hope that it doesn't grow back. Luckily it is benign according to last year's biopsy results. However, this is the second random tumour he has had since birth, no firm diagnosis have ever been reached, and this one is growing rapidly. Anyway, am dealing with one thing at a time, so any reassurance about open heart surgery would be much appreciated.