The greatest fear in bunion surgery comes from hearing stories about the pain and agony of someone who knows of someone, who heard of someone, etc. who had bunion surgery and it was the worse pain ever.
In the past foot surgery can be painful, but not with the Lam modified bunion surgery.
How we now decrease the discomfort or even eliminate post-operative pain is a multi-pronged approach.
1) Preoperative IV NSAIDs or oral NSAIDs barring allergies and kidney issues
2) Preoperative anesthesia with a nerve block despite the type of other anesthesia used such as Sedation or general anesthesia.
3) Careful incision planning
4) Careful soft tissue handling to minimize trauma and collateral soft tissue damage
5) Intricate closure of tissue to minimize bleeding
6) Post-operative long-lasting anesthetic that can give up to 8 hours of numbness.
7) Post-operative steroid injection to decrease inflammation
8) Post-operative pain medication
Most of our patients report a pain scale of 0 to 3 out of 10 (most pain) at their post-operative visit.
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