Hello all,
By now, a full three weeks have transpired since Kap’s crash to the sidewalk at Anacortes.
At the urging of our good friend, Lisa Hart (who happens to be a registered nurse), as soon as we got home Kap managed to get an appointment at Seattle Hand Surgery – reputed to be the best place in Seattle if you have a hand or wrist injury. They’re connected to Swedish Hospital on Pill Hill in Seattle, and it’s next door to the facility where the orthopedic surgeon who’s also taking care of Kap’s herniated disc in her lower back. They immediately scheduled her for an MRI, and on the next visit a day or so later, advised that she have reconstructive surgery. This was not what we wanted to hear, as we knew it might spell the end of our summer cruise – but how can you argue? It was explained that the end of the radius bone – the larger bone in the forearm that interacts with the carpal bones in the wrist to provide articulation – was compressed by about 2-3mm (1/8”), in addition to a fracture on the corner of the radius bone end.
The surgery was done at the Swedish Orthopedic Center by Dr. John Miyano on Friday, June 4th. The repair consisted of raising the bone end by the 2-3mm amount, then backfilling with donor bone chips (we didn’t ask who the donor was) to create the “structure” on which Kap’s new bone could grow. A titanium plate was then screwed onto the face of the radius bone (i.e., the inside of her wrist) to hold the fractured bit in place (and would remain there after it has grown back together). Since they would already be “working” in the general area, the doctor suggested he could also repair some carpal tunnel syndrome that Kap has had for some time.
The 2-hour surgery was a success, and is being followed up by daily physical therapy. For the first 10 days, Kap had a non-removable fiberglass splint on the arm, which completely immobilized her arm/wrist/hand from the elbow to the middle finger joints. The pain was – as you’d expect – very high, but they have really good pain meds these days, and as long as you keep ahead of it, the pain is manageable (. . . easy for me to say). Nevertheless, she didn’t get much sleep for the first few days, and spent most of the time doing pretty much nothing.
At 10 days she had her first follow-up with the surgeon, who removed the splint, removed the stitches, and we had a good look at his handiwork. I expressed my displeasure that he didn’t create a more artful scar line, but he dismissed that complaint. Afterwards, Kap went straight to her first physical therapy – which consists of hand/finger and wrist exercises – to be limited by the level of pain – and a new removable splint was fitted . . . a huge benefit, as it can be removed for showering – removing the necessity of cling-wrapping the entire arm and taping the ends shut to get in the shower.
Visits back to the physical therapist are scheduled for every Monday for four weeks – so through July 12th – and that sort of dictates when we’ll be able to think about departure for the summer cruise on Flying Colours. During the last two weeks of this time we hope to get out on Flying Colours for a couple of 4-5 day cruises, and we may even get the boat positioned at some point north of Anacortes. Kap could then fly home on Kenmore Air for her PT appointments while I stay on the boat with Raz, Gator, and ZuZu. We’ll wait to see how those ideas shake out.
Actually, the time back at home has been sort of good. We’re at a critical point in our new house design, and this gives us a chance for weekly meetings with the architect to hash out many crucial details. We also got to watch as three 40’-tall trees in our yard were felled, with the trunks cut into 10’ sections, giving us three really good-sized logs from each tree. The trees were blocking our view of the Olympic Mountains, and have been replaced by a row of Leland Cypress that will make a dense hedge to block the house in front of us from view. The trees we removed were sweetgums – a deciduous hardwood that’s indigenous to the U.S. southeast. After researching what the wood grain of a sweetgum looks like, we connected with a great little company in Seattle – Urban Hardwoods – to store the 10’ trunk sections through a 1-year curing period, after which they’ll saw them up and we’ll use them for some to-be-determined part of the new house.
So, if all goes well, we should be back on Flying Colours in the next week or so, and we’ll be ready to (finally!!!!) start the 2010 Summer Cruise. We’re still thinking we can get as far north as Ketchikan, giving us lots of time to explore the very southern tip of SE Alaska. South of Prince Rupert, B.C., there are a bunch of really neat bays and inlets that we’d otherwise pass by in our haste to get up and back to SE Alaska, so maybe this is a good benefit of the altered plans.
Next installment – hopefully we’ll be aboard Flying Colours.
Ron