Sunday, April 27, 2014

The Progression of a horrible Foot Wound

If you've read my previous posts, you already know that we had to prematurely leave Key West a couple of months ago due to a calcaneus fracture (her heel broke in two) that Tami developed after falling off a ladder.  But what was a complicated enough issue to begin with, turned very complicated when she (as best they can figure) seemed to have had an allergic reaction...


....to the local anesthetic that was administered to her foot during the surgery.   


Debridement surgery - March 6

What unfolded in the days after surgery, as half  her foot slowly became extremely painful, swollen, purple, black, and necrotic had us scrambling back and forth to the surgeon's office in a desperate attempt to understand what was happening.  It wasn't until she had already been admitted into the hospital before her surgeon thought he knew what had happened.
  


On March 6th, she had to have a major full-thickness debridement to her right foot as over half the area had necrotized and had to be removed.  If you aren't sure what a debridement is, its where (at least in Tami's case) they had to remove every layer of skin - dermis, epidermis, etc. - down to meat and tendons and in some areas, even deeper.  They even removed her hardware that was initially installed during the original surgery to repair the heel fracture on April 2.  The consensus was that since it was exposed, it was a highway for bacteria straight to her bone and because tissue has a hard time growing over hardware.  As it stands right now, she has been in either the hospital or the long term acute care facility since February 27th.  

But I've really not taken too much video of the wound up until recently because I really didn't want to think about it - we took pictures because Tami wanted to document the deterioration and the eventual progression of the wound, but stayed away from posting anything on Facebook or this blog because it just didn't feel right.  But now that some time has past, and she's on a better road to recovery, I put together this video to show the deterioration of the wound.  The next video I post will be the removal and the installation of the wound vac that she has been wearing since the initial debridement. 

So, needless to say, its hard for us to be away from the boat - we are so close to getting it in the water, and Tami gets depressed  when she thinks about it.  Although full recovery is still a way's away, she does plan to do some of her rehab down in Florida as soon as she gets the wound covered up.

2 comments:

  1. Oh man...guess I didn't realize how serious this was. Glad to hear it sounds like Tami is turning the corner on it though. My wishes for a speedy and complete recovery and return to your boat! Hang in there.

    -Mike
    ThisRatSailed

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  2. Thanks Mike. Its been a difficult road but she's kept a really good attitude about it and has been handling it like a champ, only getting down on herself just a couple of times through this whole thing - even at times when we weren't even sure she'd be able to keep her foot.

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