Stephanie in the Hospital
Monday, June 2nd, 2008Stephanie has been in Korea about a week and a half now. Before she left she dislocated her knee. It popped back in but left behind a lot of swelling and a loss of function. She didn’t appear to have torn any ligaments and x-rays didn’t show anything other than the obvious soft tissue swelling. Her pain was decreasing as her range of motion was increasing up until she left and we all felt comfortable sending her.
One of the sponsors for the school where she is teaching is a medical doctor who is the owner of a local private hospital/clinic. We sent her to the clinic for an MRI to rule out any significant internal derangement of her knee. Stephanie called us and asked why they were doing blood work and more x-rays at the same time. We just reassured her and told her to not argue…
The next day the head of the clinic spoke with us regarding the MRI findings. He said that it didn’t show much more than the x-rays but that there was some cartilage that was loose in the joint capsule and he recommended surgery to clean it up. In fact, he was prepared to operate in two hours!
Stephanie was stressed out about surgery but was reassured when they gave her the option of a local anesthetic. She consented when they told her that yes, she could video tape the operation if she wanted. (As it was, the surgeon emailed us about 50 photos from the arthroscopic procedure.) The surgeon said that the surgery would only take about 20 minutes; it took 40. He also said that she only be staying over night and would be walking around the next day.
As it turned out, she spent the next four days in the hospital, two days letting the knee drain and two more concentrating on rehab. She loved it! I know, you’re thinking, “What? How could she love it? She was stuck in a hospital for five days!” Yes, but she was treated like a queen. She was probably the most popular patient there. She had t.v. (of course) internet (만원 for her stay) and one roommate.
She got out of the hospital today (퇴원) and will get right back into the routine that she never got into in the first place. So far it has been an adventure for her (and her parents..).
Posted by steved in Travels in Korea |
June 2nd, 2008 at 10:24 pm
wow you guys were stressing like crazy, I can’t imagine. Yikes!
June 3rd, 2008 at 1:33 pm
How can she love it? LOL…
I would have gone with the good ol’ 한약…. that stuff tastes awful, but it works fantastically!
June 3rd, 2008 at 8:27 pm
Aiya, hope sh’s feeling better!
June 4th, 2008 at 5:33 am
We didn’t really have much time to stress about her having surgery half way around the world. I don’t think the speed of her treatment is typical of Korean medicine, but I could be mistaken. I do know that her experience would have been much more drawn out had she been here but she probably wouldn’t have spent more than an overnight in the hospital.
She really enjoyed all of the attention and food. I am not sure that 한약 would have cleaned up all of the cartilage floating around in her knee ;-). She is doing great right now but does not like doing her exercises. Of course.
June 4th, 2008 at 10:58 am
Yea Korean medicine won’t help you heal much. But most 한약 is made so that you don’t get sick in the first place. But my friends who took it when they were kids all said they just gained weight. And I’m sure a long time ago, that’s what was considered healthy. Having some meat on your bones.
June 6th, 2008 at 1:32 pm
what thekjsfhdjfnskjdh are you talking about?!
I loved being in the hospital??
i think it was the most boring event of my life.
the only cool part about being there was when i escaped
with my cousin to go eat 상 겹 살. because the food at the hospital
was not all that great. Plus all the waiters were pretty cute.
June 9th, 2008 at 6:44 am
Sounds like a very zealous orthopedic surgeon.
He probably thought that his reputation could get a boost by posing for pictures with the American girl that he successfully operated on.
June 11th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
Actually, pretty much everyone in 여수 knows who he is. In the hospital waiting area and the elvators all display video clips of him on TV and him preforming surgery. It does get a little gross though, they show everything that goes on during the surgery. I was staring at it and i must have had a grossed out expression on my face becasue the 아줌마 next to me in the elevator was all “보지마”or something. And when I’ve been teaching english around at different houses, there’s usually an ad for his hospital in the elevators.