Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Conjunctival lesion

I arrived at Medical City 10 minutes before 8am straight from work. Andee is scheduled for her eye operation at 8am. When I was lead into the Surgury Suite's Pre-Operative Preparation Room, I heard nurses talking to Andee asking her to do something which I heard her reply, "wala pa si Mama" (Mama is not yet here). Call it photo finish. Her lola mentioned that Andee kept on saying "wala pa si Mama.. di ba sabi niya dadating siya" when the nurses started to prepare her for surgery. I was asked to put on scrubs too--as I would accompany her inside the operating room. *What?!?!" *gulp*. I can't bear the thought of seeing her eye being 'sliced' but then again I wanted to go to be sure she's ok. Later on I found out that I would be led out of the room after Andee was put to sleep (general anesthesia).

The operation, according to Dra. Alvina Santiago, would take only about 10-15 minutes. It was 8:30am when I was led out of the operating room. Then came 9am, then 9:15am. Mama and I became restless. Friends were already texting finding out if everything went ok. Finally at 9:30am, Dra. Santiago came in and apologized that it took longer than usual. "Malaki kasi e" (It was a big one).

On the medical report, it read.. "Excision Biopsy of Conjunctival lesion (left eye) done.8.5 x 5.5mm pigmented lesion, raised, closely adjacent to limbus." After 'slicing off the mole, part of a membrane was pulled to cover the wound. It incurred 5 stitches (ouch!). The sensation that Andee will feel is something like having sand in the eyes.

After around 10 minutes, one of the nurses came in and asked me to go to the recovery room coz "nagwawala po si Andrea" (she's restless). When I got there, there were 3 nurses holding her. Andee was moaning and wanted to sit up. When I got closer I almost cried. Awa ako. She kept on asking where she was. She says she can't see. She is still a bit groggy, coming out of the anesthesia. Her right arm has welts apparently from demerol. In between, she'll sleep and all of the sudden, wake up suddenly and cry and moan. Then she said something that made me shed a tear.. When she was injected with anesthesia and was asked to breathe into the oxygen mask, which she resisted, she said.."tinatawag kita ng 'mama, mama'..pero walang lumalabas. Hindi kita matawag.." Then she started to cry.

At least it's okay. We'll know the results of the biopsy by next week.

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