You'll be taken to the post-anesthesia care unit immediately following surgery, where you'll be until you wake up. Afterward, you'll be taken to the transplant unit, where you'll remain for the remainder of your hospital stay, which will last from 7-14 days.
After Surgery
Our team will take you to the PACU immediately after surgery, where they’ll monitor your vitals while you’re still unconscious. They’ll observe your heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing, which will be assisted by a breathing machine. Once you wake up and can breathe on your own, our nurses will remove the breathing tube, and they’ll transfer you to the transplant unit. This is expected to take place two hours after surgery.
You will wake up feeling groggy and in pain. You’ll notice several tubes attached to your body:
Feeling nauseous as you regain consciousness is to be expected. This is a common side-effect of the anesthesia, so our nursing staff will provide you with medications as needed. Nurses and doctors will be coming in and out of the room to monitor your vitals. The tubes attached to your body will be removed as your condition stabilizes. You’ll remain in the transplant unit until you’re ready to be discharged.
Recovery Details
Pain is inevitable with surgery of this magnitude. To alleviate discomfort, we’ll provide you with patient-controlled analgesic (PCA), which delivers painkillers into your body at the push of a button. PCAs have been programmed to avoid accidental overmedication. Despite the PCA, your pain will not be fully alleviated, so you should be prepared to be in pain for a few days as your body heals.
The anesthesia team will need to connect you to a breathing machine to help you breathe while you’re unconscious. This machine will be disconnected shortly after you wake up, but its effects may last a little longer. You may have a mild sore throat for a day or two after the tube has been removed. Our team will encourage you to breathe deeply and cough to avoid fluids from collecting in your lungs, and also to get more oxygen flow into your body. You’ll be visited by respiratory therapists to coach you.
Your incision will have been closed with staples and dressed in gauze in the operating room. Our nurses will check on the incision frequently, clean up fluids as they leak, and change the dressings accordingly. You’ll also have three tubes (named Jackson-Pratt drains) coming out of that area. These tubes drain fluids into suction bulbs, where you’ll notice a collection of clear, yellow, or blood-colored liquids. These drains will be removed 24-48 hours after surgery. The staples will be removed once your incision has healed sufficiently, which usually takes 1 month.
You will have a tube sticking out of your abdomen that connects to the bile duct in your liver. This is the biliary stent, and it can be opened and closed so our team can collect samples of bile as needed. This will let them know if your bile ducts are flowing appropriately, if they are healing, and how your new liver is functioning. Once our team is confident that your bile production has stabilized, the stent will be removed, which usually happens about 8-12 weeks post-surgery.
You will typically be discharged from the hospital about 7-14 days after surgery, after certain criteria are met:
We will occasionally recommend a stay at a rehabilitation hospital, where you’ll focus on regaining your strength and independence. This period before you return home can be very beneficial, as you’re expected to make great improvements to your overall condition while in rehabilitation.
