Surgery for advanced
ovarian cancer
If
the cancer has spread to other areas in your pelvis or abdomen, your surgeon
will aim to remove as much of the cancer as possible. This is called debulking.
The less cancer there is after surgery, the easier it is for chemotherapy to
kill off any cells left behind.
Dr. Dodson will do the surgery laparascopically if he can get to
everything he needs to, in checking things he won’t have to open me up. If
that’s the case it is an outpatient surgery and I am able to start chemo in 2-3
days after, no heavy lifting for 6 weeks
and no submerging for 2 weeks. If
he can’t get to everything he needs to he will have to open me up giving me an
incision from my pubic line up around my belly button and up to my breast bone.
If he does that then I will be in the hospital 4-5 days, my recovery time is 8
weeks. My risk of infection is 50/50 due to my big belly because fat doesn’t
have any vascular blood supply to help it heal. If he goes in and finds
something in or on my colon he might have to do a bowel resection which is
explained below. If that’s the case then I will be in the hospital 7-10 days. I
will have to heal at that point before they would start the chemo. With taking
out some lymph nodes for biopsies those areas won’t have a place to filter
things out so I might get some swelling in my legs and my pelvis.
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