I just went to get a few groceries, and had this weird feeling my stomach like I was forgetting something. I looked at the time on my iPhone and realized that it was three years ago to the day that I went through that window in Vancouver.
Times flies I guess, as do people. ...
Just got a call from Vancouver General Hospital. Turns out in just a few weeks I’ll get the privilege of relaxing inside a big metal tube for an hour down in the MRI clinic. Apparently I can wear my own clothes, as long as there isn’t any metal on them at all. Otherwise the metal will probably rip out and go crazy in the huge magnetic fields.
The good news is that MRI’s don’t use radiation, which means my super powers will probably not be affected this round (I figure with all the CT scans and X-rays I had last year, I’ve had my share).
Should be a fun time, staring at the inside of ...
I just got back from an appointment with my plastic surgeon. After two surgeries, I am still left with a few problems, the first of which is a slight visual dissimilarity between my left and right eye, and the second is double vision above my mid line.
Based on some recent measurements I had done, my surgeon proposed four courses of action:
Do nothing
Remove a bit of skin from eyelid on my “good” eye to make it sort of match the appearance of my “bad” eye
Adjust the eyelid of my “bad” eye to make it better match my “good” eye.
Open me back up and either adjust the current implant, ...
This is a pretty important week in the life of Duane. On Tuesday I’ll meet up with my plastic surgeon which might potentially be the last meeting I have with him regarding this whole affair. My first meeting was about twelve months ago and resulted in two surgeries to my eye socket. I’ve spent this last year bouncing between doctors offices, getting eye exams, several CT scans, and will meet this week to probably wrap everything up.
In terms of my vision, it’s still not perfect. I see pretty much everything perfectly below the midline (i.e. looking straight or down), but as I look up I tend ...
Today I had a specialist appointment to fully quantify the damage to my vision from my accident last year. The appointment was about an hour of waiting in the waiting room, twiddling my thumbs, and an hour of experiments. They were forced to dilate my eyes, which means not only am I totally sensitive to light right now, but I’m having a very hard time reading anything.
Not sure the verdict, but it’s looking pretty likely that my double vision in my upgaze is probably permanent. I can potentially compensate for this by changing my eyeglass prescription to have a slight upward taper in the ...
Nearly one year ago today, four guys that I had never met before decided it would be a good idea to put my face through the plate glass window of a 7-11. Prior to that one moment in time, now forever etched into my memory, I was upstairs at the Railway Club in Vancouver, enjoying a few beers with some friends in celebration of their wedding earlier that night. Upon exiting the building, somewhere between catching a cab and eating a bag of nachos, I overheard these four guys harassing a bunch of girls just a few feet away from me.
People have told me after the fact that perhaps I should have just ...
I’m not up to writing a full blog entry, but just wanted to let everyone know I made it home and that I’m recovering. The whole hospital procedure was far harder on me this time than last time, and I still feel really shaky. Hopefully tomorrow I’ll feel alot better.
...
As I said in my last entry, I am now at home recoupering from what is hopefully my last surgery to correct the damage from November. I’ll go through a quick walk through of yesterday. I woke up around 10am and basically just tried to kill some time until I was supposed to be at the hospital. I was originally going to take a cab down there at around 12:30pm, but it was such a nice day out that I decided to just walk the whole distance myself. Surprisingly, it only took me a half hour.
Once I got there, everyone was immediately friendly. Even though I had to answer a pile more questions that I ...
Today I headed out to The University of British Columbia for an appointment with Dr. Kevin Bush, one of the best plastic surgeons (who specializes in cranial-facial reconstruction) in the province. I had some time to kill, so I spent 30 minutes just walking around enjoying the sunshine, reminiscing about the nearly eight years I spent wandering around the campus. It’s really weird being on campus in the summer. Most students don’t really have a chance to see the rose garden in full bloom, or enjoy campus life when the weather is nice out (since the school year coincides with the bad weather ...
As of this moment, I am officially “on call” for my next surgery at St. Paul’s hospital. I was hoping that I would have gotten the call on Sunday night for a Monday morning surgery (I just want it over with), but unfortunately I still haven’t had the call yet. I won’t be able to eat for twelve hours prior, so I’m pretty much guaranteed to get at least that much notice. It would be nice if they could give more notice than that, but apparently the hospitals are rather busy, and it’s difficult to book them in advance.
Photo by jekemp on Flickr (click photo to view) My dad has a ...
Ever since my injury in November, I have spent quite a bit of time in hospitals, doctor’s offices, and medical clinics. Part of those visits usually involves some interaction with medical students.
And while I’m certain that there really are good medical students out there who are passionate about helping people and eager to learn more in their field, almost every single medical student I’ve encountered has been both arrogant and misinformed, a deadly combination when you’re trying to help people who are sick or have undergone significant trauma.
My first encounter came sometime around ...
I met with my plastic surgeon this morning, and as I thought, we’re going to go ahead and do another surgery. The apparent source of my problem seems to be that the ledge that was supporting the implant ended up not being very stable, and the implant has collapsed slightly along with my eye. Also, there is slight herniation of some of orbital contents into my sinus near the back, which is most likely the source of my double vision.
The good news is that it should be nearly 100% fixable. They are going to put in another larger implant, and probably secure it using microscrews (sounds so exciting ...
I just got back from St Paul’s hospital where I picked up the data from my second CT scan. For those people living in a cave, last November some guys tooled me pretty good outside a bar and ended up fracturing several bones in my face, including the orbital floor of my left eye. What this basically meant is that there was little to no support for my left eyeball in my left socket. That was November 4th.
On November 22, I went in for plastic surgery to correct the defect under my eye and put my eye back to its proper position. They do this by sticking in a plastic sheet that is meant to hold ...
I had an appointment this morning with an eye specialist to go over the last CT scan I had a few weeks ago. Prior to the CT scan, I was told that my double vision would probably be permanent, and the displacement of my eye may not be completely fixable. However, apparently the CT scan shows that the bottom muscle of my eye is depressed into the silastic implant that was put in back in November. So basically, that muscle isn’t moving freely and is contributing to my double vision and cosmetic differences between my two eyes.
The good news is that they think they can do something about it. That ...
This afternoon at 4:30pm I have yet another CT scan down at St. Paul’s Hospital. I’ve been waiting for this one nearly a month now, so it will be nice to finally have it done. I’ve been told I can’t eat for at least four hours before the scan, so apparently this banana bread is my only meal until supper time. I’m not sure if they are putting some funky dye into my blood, but I’ll know in a few hours I guess.
Update — Ok, so it’s all over now. I got down to St Paul’s at around 4:15pm and just chilled in the waiting area for a while. At around 4:35, some lady calls me up and walks ...
Normally I’d be writing about Erin’s wedding, posting some photos and saying what I good time I had. Unfortunately, something happened on the way home that night that sort of changed the focus of this blog entry. After the wedding, a few of us decided to go down to the Railway Club for a few more drinks. After it was over, everyone slowly made their way into cabs and headed back home. I was the last guy to get one, so since it was proving difficult to get a cab, I made my way into the store right beside the Railway Club and got some food. After I came out, I overheard three guys bugging three ...