UK Keratoconus Self-Help and Support Association

I was wondering if any other grafter's have had a bad run of illness after there op.

In the last seven weeks since my graft I have had Tonsillitis followed by a tooth Abscess (which ended in a failed extraction to release the pressure resulting in another operation in hospital in the near future) some sort of virus and then finally Tonsillitis again this week.

To say I am thoroughly fed up right now is a understatement. I asked my consultant yesterday and he thinks it is just a coincidence.

Apart from that the eye has been going great.

Anybody else had the same sort of experience.
Chris

Shame Sorry Chris, perhap the anaesthetic wore your system down?
I also had my graft 7 weeks ago, and I have been generally fine. It took me at least 3 weeks to feel 100% after the 2.5hours of general aneathetic, but other than that I am okay. Eye is doing wonderfully- I am ecstatic actually. my vision is 6/12 uncorrected--- WOW! I know it may not last, but I will enjoy it while I can. as I am typing this my grafted eye vision is actually better than my ungrafted eye with piggyback RGP (blurriness on lens which needs to be cleaned every 1 hour). I really didnt expect that.
Hope you feel better soon. I have to say that I hate toothache MORE than eyeache....
Melissa

Chris,
Sorry to hear you are feeling rough I too felt pretty shaky post-op. I think the general really wipes you out (rather than the actual surgery), so I am not surprised you have had a run of illness.
Question for a medical type: do the steroids supress your immune system and therefore make you more vulnerable?
Hope you get better soon.

Sorry to hear you aren't doing so well Chris. Hang in there! Its good to hear the eye itself is doing well.
Steroids can suppress the immune system, but it really depends on the dose. Generally, low doses wont result in significant long term suppression.

Hey, Chris

Thinking of you! Sorry you have run into a catalogue of problems with your health, but just because it came after your graft does not mean that it came because of your graft.

All the best

Andrew

Chris, sorry to hear you've had a run of ill-health.
Did you have your graft under general or local?
If the former - did you wake up with a sore throat and do a lot of coughing? - if not immediately, in the short-term aftermath?
I remember lying on the hospital floor coughing my guts up and complaining how my throat hurt.
Whether or not - is it possible that something the medical team put down your throat while you were unconscious rubbed or scratched the back of your throat and made it more vulnerable to infection?
They may have been using something called an "LMA" - which is to keep your airway open while you're "out" so you can keep breathing OK (remember lesson one of first aid course? - unconscious patient goes in recovery position, because if they're left on their back they might swallow their tongue and choke.....) Well, for an eye op, you have to be on your back, so they have to take other steps to keep your airway fonctioning.
As regards steroids: being on steroids reduces one's immunity to viral infections.
I'd have thought it unlikely that steroids instilled as eye drops would have had that much effect on one's overall susceptibility.
But strange things do happen.....
OTOH, did you put steroids into your system with the anaesthetic drugs? - apparently they gave me 8mg of dexa. intravenously about half an hour into the op, plus an unspecified quantity into my eye. No idea if that's a quantity likely to affect resistances to viruses - particularly as I puff a lot of steroids anyway for my asthma.
Can't start to account for tooth abcess - usually bacterial infection, I think????? - other than being run down from the other things may have made it "take off".
HOpe you're on the mend soon.
Rosemary

To answer the original question......
No, I didn't seem to be getting infections or illnesses.
After my nasty experiences with the op, I suppose that is one relief.....
in fact, after the first few days of coughing and coughing and coughing till I was sick, I finally seemed to have got rid of the various throat etc bugs that I'd never quite got rid of since October.
OTOH, 8 weeks today post-graft, I'm still having problems with the various bits of brain-function that never recovered after a neck injury in an accident at work a few years ago. Have finally got an appointment at the neurology hospital on Friday to try and work out what's gone wrong there and if there's anything at all that can be done about them.
Rosemary

Thanks for the answers and support,
Since the last batch of Tonsillitis last week my sight has got noticablly worse.
I happened to see the consultant on Tuesday and when i told him this I think he was quite worried that all the coughing had damaged the graft. It all seemed to be OK but the vision still has not recovered to the level it was a week last Thursday.
Hopefully it is only a minor setback.
Chris

Sorry to hear about this Chris. Hope all goes better now.