After months of waiting, my failing implant on the left was removed and replaced yesterday. It did not go smoothly, but at least I wasn’t awake — I only heard about it after the fact.

Backing up a little, I didn’t get word from the doctor’s office about the insurance approval for the surgery until early April, more than a month and a half after I saw the doctor; I got the letter directly from the insurance company saying it was approved before the surgeon’s office did, for some reason. Anyway, the earliest date they had available was May 18th, which was later than I had hoped, so they said they’d check with the doctor and see if they could move it earlier. I didn’t hold out much hope for that, but 2 weeks ago I got a call asking if I wanted to have it done on April 26th. Though we had plans to take a trip that week, we decided this was more important and postponed it, and I rushed to get my pre-op physical done in time.

The hospital intake process was the same as the last two times: get undressed and into a gown, answer a whole lot of questions about my health, current medications, etc., talk to the doctor and anesthesiologist, and have my vitals taken and an IV set up. Aside from being a little cranky from hunger as the surgery was scheduled late in the afternoon so I couldn’t eat all day, no real issues there. (Bonus: the new date meant I would not be on my period during this surgery, as I was for the last two, and would have been if the original May date had not been changed.) The doctor said that since this was a removal and replacement rather than a new implant, it shouldn’t take long — maybe an hour or so. This turned out to be optimistic on his part.

I was wheeled back to the OR, scooted over onto the operating bed, gave them my right CI processor (which I had kept on till the last minute so they wouldn’t have to pantomime instructions in the OR), had the mask placed over my face…and then I was waking up. They gave me a cup of water and called Ray in, and that’s when I found out that there had been problems, and it had taken way more than an hour — there were no clocks around, so I hadn’t realized that it was almost 10pm when I woke up.

Ray said that the doctor had been out to see him 3 different times; he’d taken out the failed implant easily enough, but was unable to get the new one positioned correctly due to scar tissue, so he tried the backup, and was also unable to get that one in. He considered giving up, letting me heal for a month or so, and trying again, but decided to give the first one another try and was able to do it. The surgeon’s notes on what happened:

“A postauricular incision was then made. Dissection was carried down to the mastoid cavity where the previously placed cochlear implant was identified. This was dissected free from the surrounding soft tissue and bone before it was removed. The area of the round window niche was inspected and was found to be significantly scarred. The facial recess was drilled further open to achieve better visualization. The area of the round window niche was debrided and an attempt was made to place the new implant. After multiple tries, the back-up implant was placed, but xray did not show the electrode to be in place and NRT testing showed suspect results. The patient was then re-prepped and draped. The area of the round window niche was further debrided of scar and apparent boney regrowth at the round window was drilled away. The new cochlear implant was then inserted into the cranial well, and the implant was then placed to full insertion. This was confirmed by Xray. The wound bed was then copiously irrigated with normal saline. The electrode was coiled within the mastoid cavity.”

So it was after 10 by the time I got home; I ate some leftovers and went to bed. Didn’t really sleep, but I expected that as it happened the first two times as well, from the steroids they gave me during the surgery. I’ve lost my sense of taste on that side, but that happened on the other side when I went bilateral and it came back after a few months, so I’m not that worried. The only thing really making me miserable is that my chronic post-nasal drip has kicked into overdrive. At least it doesn’t hurt to cough. Ray has gone to fill my antibiotic prescription and find me some cough drops. I won’t bother to get the painkiller prescription filled, as I didn’t have much pain with the previous surgeries and the same is true so far with this one. If that changes in the next couple days, I can always go fill it.

Last time I got implanted, I only took off work on surgery day and the day after, but now I’m taking the whole week, mostly because I didn’t travel last year due to the pandemic, so I have vacation time to burn before my work anniversary date next month. So I’ll be taking it easy this week.