Post-op pain in upper legs, thighs?

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Sat, 13 Jan 2007 16:19:09 +0100

Hi...i too had pain in one leg after surgery....i also had a DVT....it was diagnosed with a doppler right away...so you might ask about that. Also and its 4 yrs out i still have neuropathy in my left inner thigh...and early on some pain going down the leg...i went to a chiropractor who also has a medical degree and he got me straightened out very quickly with some physical therapy and cold pack treatments. I still have numbness in one section of the leg and occasionally the pain comes back but i just do the therapy he gave me and get the pressure off the nerve thats being affected.......Pat - Patricia

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Sat, 13 Jan 2007 10:40:16 +0100

Ellen,
If you can't get your surgeon/urologist to get your husband to a physical therapist or massage therapist maybe your primary care physician would refer you to one. I am going to a physical therapist for lymphedema and after my surgery which was 10-19-06 I had neuropathy which my surgeon and my local uro said was VERY common after this surgery. They said it happens with a very long surgery, the position you are in on the table and other factors can cause neuropathy. I fortunately have a daughter-in-law who is a massage therapist and at the beginning she massaged my legs which helped the neuropathy and now she is doing lymph drainage. Maybe he doesn't need a physical therapist but I would say at the very least he needs a good massage therapist or maybe a combination of both.
Best of luck with finding some help for your husband.
Blessings....Jean - Jmema

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Sat, 13 Jan 2007 07:06:06 +0100

Hi,

Sorry to hear about your husband's complications. I've heard the same complaints from other men and women, post-op. Sometimes this is due to the strain of surgery itself, from the position on the operating table, being in an unnatural position for many hours. It can cause a kind of nerve damage (neuropathy) to the thighs and/or legs. Sometimes it takes a while to go away. I know of one person who was left with a permanent limp. Most times it clears up on its own but may take a while, how long is anybody's guess, everyone is different.

This may or may not be the problem your husband is experiencing, but it's something to ask the doctor about. The surgeon is obviously not a physical therapist. Maybe he has never encountered this problem before (but I find that hard to believe!). I would say...get a consultation with a physical therapist to discuss what is going on. Sometimes it's a relieft just to be able to put a name to the problem.

I had nerve damage after a mastectomy in '99, the surgeon treated me like I was a mental case when I described the symptoms and it took a while to get a diagnosis (which I finally got from a GP). When I did get that diagnosis, it explained a lot, made me feel better even though the pain was more or less untreatable, although I went to the pain management team at the cancer center and tried many different drugs. It did go away, but took a few years. This is different from your husband's pain, mine was from the incision. His could very well be a side effect of surgery too, though.

I received physical therapy for about a year for my arm, which was affected too. After 2-3 years life became more or less normal again.

I hope you get some more input on this problem from people who have been through the same thing.

Good luck with finding the cause of the pain.

Wendy - Wendy