Aquablation procedure review , 2/23

Men's health
1

I had my Aquablation on 2/23, at Woodbridge VA, Sentara Hospital. Just yesterday, so I will give a first update and then give an update every few days during the healing period over the next few weeks.

Sentara hospital staff was first class. From the guy that checked me in at the door, to the nursing staff in preop, the anesthesiologist, surgical techs, and of course the doctor, were all super nice and professional. My surgery was scheduled for 2:30 and it went off at about 2:50 so even the scheduling was good.

This wasnt just propofol, it was the real deal anesthesia with breathing tube (and my throat is still sore). I joked with the staff in the OR for maybe 30 seconds, and then i was in recovery. I was out before I even knew they were pushing the drugs.

Woke up, groggy for maybe 10 minutes. Not bad. Super uncomfortable with the garden hose catheter they use, lol. Gave some dilaudid in recovery, and then some pain pills over that night (Norco I think). And Pyridium. After moving to a regular room, it was very nice, all the staff I cant say enough good things about. Very friendly people that really seemed to care a lot.

The catheter is pretty uncomfortable, but with the pain pills and pyridium it is manageable until they remove it next day. But oh man, it hurts when they pull it out. I wish they would have given me a little squirt of the good stuff in my IV before they did that.

Removing the catheter, next is just drink tons of water, juice, soda, until you can pee. I was super anxious about having to maybe be catheterized again and mybe spend another night. After not being able to pee for a couple hours, i finally got a tiny bit out. Kept drinking, and eventually started peeing in smaller bursts. More drinking and walking the hallways, and eventually I got a small bit of a stream, with more smaller squirts. But hey at least i was able to pee. and bladder residual was almost none.

So…dang once i started peeing, I had drank so much I had to go every 3-5 minutes for what seemed like an hour. Definitely not even close to a normal stream. But hey its only 24 hours since the surgery.

At home now, taking some pain meds and pyridium, and continuing to drink water and gatorade.

I will update as I heal up. I anticipate the first week to be sort of rough, and next week to be better, and maybe if I’m one of the lucky ones I’ll be doing good by the third and fourth weeks. That is my hope.

2

Update day 3: Only got up twice last night, which for me is very unusual. I am used to getting up 4 times or more a night. Really surprised! Yesterday even though I was taking pyridium which colors the urine orange, it was really quite red, so no doubt I had blood in there as well. Today seems mostly orange, so little if any blood today.

Overall I’m very pleased with my progress so far. My stream is at least as strong as before surgery now, and perhaps even better.

3

Update day 5: I’m not really seeing any improvements yet in flow/stream, and still have a good bit of frequency. My flow isn’t terrible, but only about the same as pre-surgery, maybe a bit better. I’m not worried as it’s only day 5, and many guys report that it takes more like 1-2 months.

I am very pleased with how easy the recovery has been so far. I really only had blood in the urine on the day after the procedure, and the next day. I was taking pain pills on day 2 as well as Pyridium. I was able to stop that on Day 3, just took some extra strength Tylenol that day, and haven’t taken any pain med at all since Day 3. I really had set myself up mentally for a much more difficult recovery, and I’m so happy that it’s been way easier than I thought. Zero pain. No blood in urine since day 2.

At this point, I feel like I could easily go back to my pre-surgery routine 100%. Golf, swim, walk a couple miles a day, lift stuff, etc. I’m following orders and being careful with my activity, so I’m not doing any strenuous stuff for 4-5 weeks. I’m just saying, I feel good enough that I could do that stuff, if I was allowed to.

Right now it’s just a waiting game, to see how long it takes until I get the improvements in stream, frequency, less trips to bathroom at night.

4

bcb1, Wow! You are exceptional! For most people blood in the urine stops between 2nd and 3rd week. Mine stopped just before the third week.

5

My prostate was not very big, and I would imagine that is the reason. only about 30cc. But, I had obstruction pushing into my bladder, a third lobe. So the aquablation was still the right therapy, and my surgeon has done them on many smaller prostates, where guys had similar issues.

My operative time was only 30 minutes, where most procedures take more like an hour. He had to cut the bladder neck to allow the water jet probe to lay on the prostate bed.

I had a PAE previously, so I am sure that probably helped reduce my prostate size. Unfortunately a PAE won’t get rid of obstructions. Only a resective procedure can do that.

6

Thank makes sense then. Good luck with the recovery.

7

Good to hear that your recovery is going well. i am also positively surprised that your recovery is way faster than many of us, but that’s a good thing. You followed my thread and i am checking out your thread to see how your procedure went and it’s good to hear that everything is fine.
With my recovery (I am now 2 1/2 months in) there is one issue though, which seems to be RE.
Because i don’t want kids, it is not a big deal for me…but i am surprised by it.
I think i will post my final update(i my thread) after 3 months and after i get a PSA test done.

8

I did follow your thread very closely, and it really helped me to prepare mentally for my procedure. I was ready for a difficult first week or two. It very much surprised me that mine went much easier than I was expecting.

My guess - is that maybe, lots of patients that have an easy time don’t bother to post their experiences. They go home, have an experience that maybe is similar to mine where they have a couple days of downtime, and then go on about their lives and the last thing they think about is posting about their experience.

The threads here helped me a lot; so I definitely wanted to post about my Aquablation. It would be great if this forum was designed a little bit better and had a wider audience, so there could be a much larger number of posts about the various procedures. As it is, these personal experiences are pretty hard to find on the internet.

9

Forgot to mention, one product that I took for about a week before the surgery (1 capsule a day), and after the surgery (about 2-3 capsules a day) was called Heal Fast Surgery & Injury Recovery. It’s pricey - I think I paid like $65 for a bottle! My wife had a friend in her workout class that took it before & after her surgery and she swore how well it worked, how she recovered really quick. So I figured I’d give it a shot as well.

I am certainly not a spokesman for the stuff, and I have no way of knowing if it really helped me get better so fast or not. The only way to know that for sure is to have some sort of a trial with guys that take it, as well as guys that get a placebo, and compare the results. But, I figured for $65 it was worth trying. Even if it helped somewhat, for me it was worth it.

The other thing I’ve done, is continue Flomax after surgery, and taking Celebrex daily as well. I will discontinue the Flomax after another week or two. I have never taken Celebrex daily, I only take it as needed, so I will probably stop it when I stop the Flomax.

10

I wonder why they dont give you some pain meds before they pull the cath out? How painful was it to pee and for how long?

thanks

11

the pain is bearable..no need for pain meds…it’s like ripping off a band aid…the pain lasts for about 3 seconds.
with the catheter you don’t really pee..it all trickles into the bag.
after catheter removal , there is this burning sensation, but none of it is very painful.
catheter removal pain is like 6-7 out of 10 , for a couple seconds.
while you have the catheter in, it is just an uncomfortable feeling. Once you get used to it, it is not too bad though. The problem arises when you get hard…that can be somewhat painful.
Of course everyone’s pain tolerance is different. This was just my experience.
i had a catheter in for 3 days , then they removed it , but after 3-4 days later they had to put in the catheter again for another 3-4 days. Putting the catheter in , was more painful then removing it by the way.

12

Quite a few years ago I broke a rib. The pain was excruciating. It felt like I had been run through with a steel rod. For weeks every time I moved it hurt. This reset my pain scale to where when asked on a scale from 1-10 what my pain level is, its usually a 1 or 2.

13

Why did you have to do the PAE in addition to the aqua ablation.