Sacroiliac Joint Surgery

Here is a little update on my surgery. 

On 07 Dec 2023 I had surgery on my lower back. My sacrum and ilium (as seen in pic below) are no longer properly attached to each other by the sacroiliac joint.  

The sacroiliac joint is normally formed with ligaments and cartilage. In my case the cartilage is completely gone and for several years now the joint has been nothing but bone on bone. To repair the sacroiliac joint they have to put in sacroiliac fusion cages on each side. Last Thursday they did my right side sacroiliac joint. They had planned to use three of the sacroiliac fusion cages but they were able to use just two. 

 Here is a pic of a sacroiliac fusion cage. It is just a large pin that is hallow. I have two of these on my right side. 

I don't know yet if the surgery helped out  or not. I'm still in a hell of a lot of pain. The surgeon told me that B.L.T. was out of the question at least until my two week follow up. That made me want to eat several B.L.T.'s just to show them that eating a bacon sandwich would not destroy my hip. Then they explained that No B.L.T. means No Bending, No Lifting, No Twisting. That is a load off my back because I could really use a sandwich right now. 

After the surgery on Thursday the hospital staff really irritated me. My room was really hot so me and Desi kept asking for a fan and they said that they don't have any. So I was laying there sweating all darn day. Then the night nurse came in and got a fan that was hidden in my rooms closet. That helped out a lot. Then later on another nurse showed us that the rooms heater is actually a heat and air unit. We set the temp down to 58 degrees for a bit and things got a little bit better. 

Then there was the issue with my pain medicine and insulin. I had just had surgery and they would not get me any pain medicine! They would say, "If you are in pain let us know and we will get your pain medicine" I would tell then and they would go off  to get it and we would not see them again. It is like they got distracted and never bothered. Then one they would come back again I tell them that I need pain medicine and they would again go off to get it and never return. 

Also during the surgery they gave me steroids, and this caused my glucose to sky rocket. The glucometers that we were using topped out at 400. So all day Thursday they would not give me any insulin to lower it. All day long my insulin was at least 400. Then Thursday evening a nurse gave me 6 units of the insulin that I normally use 20 units on. 

Once I got home I was able to get back into my routine on insulin and medicine and now I'm starting to feel human. It hurts really bad, I can't put any weight on it. I ended up getting 9 staples so this makes the first time that I got staples. 

So now I'm in bed rest and can't do anything for at least 2 weeks. Once I recover from this surgery then we will get my left side fixed. Until then I have to really take it easy because my hips are kind of lop sided. One side has a strong joint and the other side has nothing there to hold it together. 

Well that is about it, feel free to leave any comments in the comments section below. You can email me at Aaron@K5ATG.com