Recovery From Surgery: Everything You Wanted to Know but Didn't Want to Ask

Regardless if the surgery is a planned one or not, if you are having surgery, you may be interested in learning how you can heal faster, return to work faster, and get back to the gym faster. Overall, recovering from surgery is a fairly straightforward process of following your discharge instructions given to you by your surgeon, and a few other tips I’ll share below.

Obviously, it depends on the type of surgery you have undergone, but for some overall guidance on how best you can recover from surgery, here are some helpful hints for how to be the patient who heals quickly, easily, and faster than the surgeon predicted:

1. Follow Your Healthcare Provider's Instructions

Whether these instructions come from your surgeon or your Physical Therapist, please follow them verbatim. Some patients follow the instructions that they think are meaningful and disregard the ones that they don’t like or don’t feel apply to them. If your healthcare provider says showers only, or no swimming, or tells you not to lift anything heavier than 10 pounds for the first few weeks after surgery, there is likely a very good reason for this. If you have questions about any of the instructions, please ask! We are always willing to help and provide explanation and guidance.

2. Prevent Infection and Care for Incision

Preventing infection is one of the most important things you can do to have an excellent outcome from your procedure. Washing your hands before touching your incision is one of the easiest and most important things you can do during your recovery.

Looking at your incision may not be your favorite thing to do, but it is important that you take a good look at your incision several times a day. Some procedures make this task difficult, therefore in this case use a mirror or loved one to help you inspect.

Is your incision pink or red? Is there a wound drainage and what color is it? Are the stitches or staples intact? These questions are very important and looking at your incision several times a day will help you determine if your surgical site is continuing to heal or if it has become infected.

Surprisingly in some cases, patients try to get their incision a bit too clean. They want to scrub their incision and remove the scabs that form, or they want to use alcohol or peroxide to keep the area free of germs. Unless your surgeon specifically instructs you to do any of those things, a gentle wash with soap and water is more than adequate.

It may not be pretty, but it is normal to have scabbing on your surgical staples. Removing them could actually cause your incision to heal far more slowly.

Soaking your incision in an effort to keep it clean can also be harmful because it can weaken the incision line. Many surgeons recommend showers instead of baths following surgery and often forbid swimming during the early stages of recovery and these are the reasons.

3. Keep Your Follow-Up Appointments

You will be surprised to hear that many patients do not keep all of their follow-up appointments. If you are feeling good and your wound is healing well, an appointment may seem like an unneeded expense and waste of time. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Your healthcare provider will want to know how you feel and if your incision is healing well, but they will be looking for additional things that you may not. Your surgeon may be looking for something you cannot see, especially if your incision isn’t visible.

They may do follow-up blood work, look for signs of infection, or want to make sure your condition has been adequately treated by the surgery. You may also require adjustment of your medications in the weeks following surgery.

4. Drink and Eat Properly

Many people don’t feel like eating after having surgery. They are nauseated, constipated, or just not hungry. Staying hydrated and eating a healthy diet after surgery can help promote healing, minimize complications, and help you get past some side effects of anesthesia. It is hard to heal if your body doesn’t have the fuel it needs to get better.

5. Know When to Go to the ER

Are your symptoms normal or a sign of an emergency? The general answer is this: If you are seriously concerned, then you should call your healthcare provider or go to an ER.

In general, if you are bleeding, having trouble breathing, can’t keep food/water down, cannot urinate, or you have obvious signs of infection, you need to see a healthcare provider and the quickest way to do this sometimes is going to the ER. Don’t delay! If you are concerned or anything seems out of the ordinary, don’t take the chance. Go to the ER!

6. Control Your Pain

Keeping your pain under control is very important after surgery. Some patients hesitate to take their pain medication as prescribed because they fear addiction or other issues. Others feel that taking pain medication is a sign of weakness, or they don’t like how they feel when they take prescription drugs.

However, if you are in too much pain to cough, you are at risk for pneumonia. If you are in too much pain to walk, you are at risk for blood clots and pneumonia.

Keeping your pain at a tolerable level (no pain may be an unreasonable goal) will help you keep moving and speed the healing process. Just make sure to drink ample fluids along with pain medications, as they can lead to dehydration and constipation.

It is often easier to control pain if you take the medication regularly, as prescribed. Waiting until the pain is severe and then taking pain medication results in a long wait for the drug to take effect.

It is better to keep the pain under control and at a tolerable level, rather than waiting until it is severe and waiting for relief. Good pain control can make it far easier to sleep, which also promotes healing.

7. Get Moving

Walking after surgery is one of the most important things you can do after having a procedure. It may seem like a simple thing, but a quick walk every hour or two can help prevent serious complications like deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and pneumonia.

Walking can also help prevent one very common and annoying side effect of anesthesia—constipation. Walking is a gentle way to return to physical activity and can help promote a return to regular activities.

Talk to your surgeon about when you can return to more strenuous activities, such as running and contact sports. Swimming should wait until your wound is completely closed.

Jessica Tranchina, PT, DPT, is a co-founder of Generator Athlete Lab and has been an athlete her whole life. As the creator of the Generator Method, Tranchina works to help guide others to better performance and recovery and is passionate about bringing the activite community of Austin together from all fitness levels and athletic backgrounds.

She is the owner of PRIMO Performance and Rehabilitation, started in Austin in 2010, where her expertise and unique skill set have been established as one of the best in her field. NASM-CPT, ART Certified Provider, CKTP.

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