Patient experience with open surgery for Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm repair

Okay, if you don't mind introducing yourself at all. So, my name is Oscar White. I've undergone vascular surgery for a large aneurysm in my abdomen, which was a complete success. And you had that on the 28th of March. And it was a complex aneurysm because it went up all the way to your kidney arteries, and your kidney arteries and your gut arteries were quite close together, and it was very large in size, wasn't it? It wasn't. Well, I didn't know anything about it. I had no real effects, none or nothing from it. Absolutely not. And I think slightly tender to it when we pressed on it, so we did an open operation, didn't we? Yes, as I understand it, yes, you obviously did. With a big cut in the belly. Yeah, that's right, that's correct. And it was complex in terms of the surgery. I think you've had a look at some pictures from inside yourself. Yes. So we did an open aortic juxtarenal repair, which means clamping the aorta above the renal arteries to do the repair. And we had to bypass to the gut arteries because the superior mesenteric artery to your guts was injured because it was so close to the kidney arteries. I just can't thank you enough. But you've done very well, haven't you, in terms of recovery? Absolutely. I was out the following Sunday. We went out, we actually went out, didn't we? Yes, we did. The Sunday after the operation. I wasn't 100% but obviously that early, but we went out. So I think importantly at Imperial we check your heart and lungs before as much as we could. We couldn't stress your heart for this case, because you had a large aneurysm, but we did have a good idea of how you'd feel. You know, the size of the aneurysm amused me, because I had an x-ray for the hip before that, when they found it, and there didn't appear to be anything on it. So would it just occur just like that, over a short period? It would have grown over many, many years. But they never found any on the first lot of x-rays I had for my hip. It wouldn't show up on a hip x-ray. That's where I showed up. Well it didn't, it showed up on the ultrasound. No, no, no it didn't show up. The surgeon who was going to carry it out of the hip found that suspect. Shadowing, yeah. And he thought, let's have a look at this. The alternative way of repairing this would be the keyhole or endovascular approach. Yes, I like your keyhole surgery. It looks more like hangar door surgery. Not very keyhole at all, but the keyhole would have taken three months to prepare the graft and we thought there wasn't time. And also the keyhole would have taken a long time. It would have been a complex repair and possibly the durability of it would have been compromised. So I think people might be surprised at your age now. Yes, I've come to 80. 89, 80 in February. 80 in February. But weighing up the risks and the benefits and looking at everything in the balance, probably we made the right choice, because here you are. Well, you made the choice for me, Doctor. Oh, yes. You made the choice. It's shared, shared decision making together, really. You did a fantastic job. I think a lot to do with yourself and your good lady wife and your motivation, how much you worked. Total praise for the National Health, total praise. I shall be sending an email to the hospital. I haven't done it yet, but I'll try and see what happens today. I shall send an email to everybody. An important message we wanted to, you know, get out was that you worked very hard after the operation. The breathing exercises, getting up out of bed, and that was a major part of your recovery. Yeah. Yes, I must admit, we did that quite well because, well, the staff there were so helpful. You know, there was people in there and they were shouting, nurse, nurse. Oh, yes, yes. They're doing their best. They looked after me. Here I am, an 80-year-old man. How much life have I got left? You know, another 20 years, hopefully. Fingers crossed, eh? But honestly, I've got nothing but praise for you, doctor. Nothing but praise. Often these operations, we double up in terms of the surgeons. Certainly, in your case, another one of my colleagues joined us, Mr. Bignall, and we operated on a significant part of the operation together, which I think helps as well to improve the safety, improve the quality, and get you through. Yes. So, any regrets? No, not at all. How could you have regrets when you come out of such a major surgery? He's quite good, apart from his hip. My hip is still the problem, obviously, so that had to be cancelled because that was due to be done on the 29th of May. We got a letter the day before saying it's because you haven't turned up for your appointment. I said, hang about. You were a bit indisposed. So there's no interconnection on the computer, apparently, between the different surges. Anything that was unexpected in your experience that you want to tell other people? No, it was a complete shock to be rushed from one hospital to another by an emergency ambulance. I'm not saying there was anything wrong with you. That was a complete shock. We were in the ambulance. The two guys were Australian guys on a crew on the ambulance. They said, lie still, you know, just lie still. You're in a dangerous condition, I think the words they used. and there'd be a team waiting for you when you get to the St. Mary's. Boy, were they waiting, boy! And now you're back to looking after Concord? Yes, oh yes, I was there yesterday. You used to work on the actual production of Concord? No, no, no, in British Airways, yes, yeah. Oh yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. I studied it in Dade, yes. Engineering. Engineering, yes. Many years. Yeah, and it was, well, the lads were surprised to see me back so quick, to be honest. Yeah, because he did go back to Brooklyn soon, didn't he? I went to Brooklyn at the week... A few weeks afterwards. About two weeks after the... I said, dear, you're not going now. And I felt quite good. You know, I didn't feel any... I just felt the same as I did before I had the operation. Just a little weak, you know, the legs were a little weak and... The constipation was, for a couple of days anyway, it wasn't so good, but then it settled down. I'm perfect now. So that's the only complaint I had, which is not a hard complaint, is it? Back to normal now? Back to normal, yes. Absolutely. Thank you very much for sharing your experience. It's my pleasure. Believe you me. Thank you. I can't thank you enough. I really can't, because you've done a fantastic job. job. They're very kind sir.