Update - 4/3/09 - 7:15PM - All Good

Lynn is in her room for the night, and is doing fine. They moved her out of recovery around 7pm. Pretty disoriented, and her neck hurts, but otherwise fine.

Dr. Blossom came up and talked to me as soon as she had been settled into recovery. He told me that the operation took quite a bit longer then expected. The reason was, there was much more work to do on the artery than they thought. Dr. Blossom had to remove plaque from a section of artery that was between 1-1/2 and 2" long. Most people do not have plaque area that goes that far...only about 20% of the population has this. Also, it was higher up in the neck than usual, and there was more things that he had to work around than for most people. One thing that they were worried about was that, because of the high location, they might have to get into muscle and nerves that affect the tongue and jaw. In some cases, around 5%, a patient has a temporary problem with talking and swallowing afterwards. However, in this case, Lynn appears to have sided with the 95% majority (for once) and their physical tests show that she can move everything well and without any problems. He also noted that there were no blood clots along the plaque area. Evidently, when they are present, there is a much greater chance of stroke later on. And, of course, her heart held up fine, and there were no issues there.

Lynn will be spending the night here, and then, according to what they said in the prep area, will be able to head home around noon. Susan called Jo and let her know what was up, and I called Gary, Christa, Rhonda and my Mom. Hopefully between them and this blog, the word will get out. She is sleeping right now, and, since she slept just a tad the last few nights, she hopefully will saw logs all night long. I'll fill everyone in more later if there is anything else to pass on =