Tonsillectomy - advice

[Bugsy2]

Saw consultant this morning & apparently they have to come out. Am wetting myself with fear as the op sounds awful.
Does anyone have experience of adult tonsillectomy which I might find reassuring?

[lou33]

Good luck to you too.

Btw, she was given soluble paracetamol and liquid codeine as painrelief to bring home, and it seems to have kept it under control. Also got voltarol while in hospital. They gave her painrelief before she went down to theatre, and again wehn she came back, but because she was too sore to swallow, her first post op dose was rectally.

[Bugsy2]

Thanks Lou. Glad to hear that your dd is recovery well.

[lou33]

you sound like my dd.

There are two ways of removing the tonsils apparently. They can sometimes just grab the tonsils themselves for removal, resulting in less pain and recovery time, but if the tonsils are badly scarred like dd1's were, they have to remove part of the tonsil bed as well, which gives a more sore throat

[Bugsy2]

I get 5/6 bad bouts of tonsillitus every year - hence removal. They are enormous & very badly scarred - making them very prone to infection.
Glad to hear it wasn't as bad as you thought Maddiemo. Thank you Tinker, for clearing up why it was 4 wks - phew!!!!!

[lou33]

still have to stay home for 2 weeks, no visitors, only the family you live with , to prevent infection. One week left and dd1 can go to school again

[Tinker]

Thanks maddie, posts crossed

[maddiemo]

I think it is two weeks and you are supposed to stay at home because of risk of infection.
Also need to make sure you keep eating.

[Tinker]

Ah. Well, only 4 weeks for me because I got an ear infection. The advice may have changed (17 years ago now) about the staying indoors for 2 weeks as well.

[maddiemo]

I had mine out about a year ago. Operation was no where near as bad as expected.
I managed to eat my lunchbox in the early evening after the op. Had no problems eating. Hospital kept me well dosed up with painkillers.
The very worst thing was that I vomited up some blood that had gone into stomach during op but after it came up I felt fine.
You do need the full two weeks to recover though. I felt very tired and it took a good week before I felt up to a small trip to school to collect boys.

Why do you need to have them out? I used to get a quinsy every six months and the pain from that was far worse than the op.

Good luck

[Bugsy2]

4 weeks off work - OMG, feel faint! I am self-employed, we'll starve.

[lou33]

dd1 is 13 and had hers out last week,she is recovering nicely. Was only in overnight

[Tinker]

Me. Had it at 23. Hurts for a day or so afterwards and you need to be quarantined in your house for 2 weeks - difficult in your position I would guess. There is a risk of infection (I got a very painful ear infection) but, after all that (and 4 weeks off work ) glad had it done.

[lunavix]

Dp had it recently, he had complications with the anaesthetic but apart from being pretty sore afterwards he was fine