most painful procedure

[em]

most painful procedure thus far for me at least

I go to the VA hospital cause I can, my local hospital does not treat HIV? They will admit you if you have pneumonia or something but they turned me away when I was very ill and gave me some antihistamines and sent me packing.I then went to the VA were they admitted me.

At that time around  twenty years ago my limp nodes in my throat were the size of golf balls and the ones in my thighs were the size of base balls 


 while being hospitalized for something or other related to HIV  I woke up in the middle of the night to find a doc standing over me I had never met. sticking a needle into a limp node in my thigh. He was taking a fluid sample to test . now I have had spinal taps they did not hurt anywhere as much as that did. I guess they wanted to know how my body was trying to remove the virus and what the limp nodes were doing and contained ?? I guess.

The VA being a training hospital the young docs like to give spinal taps to check for meningitis when I act all crazy . I do not know if they expect to find something or they are trying to punish me into not being crazy anymore shock treatment if you will.   

Not to scare  newbies but that is the VA and was a long time ago at lest twenty years
 

[BT65]

Em, it sounds awful.  I believe the most painful procedure I went through was childbirth.  I was in labor for over 30 hours, and the last 12 hours of labor were heavily induced.  I was not given anything for pain at all, before or during the birth due to it slowing down labor and the birthing process.  And the doctor had to give me an episiotomy, without pain meds, to allow the head to pass through the canal.

I've had many, many medical procedures but that was definitely the worse.  Although, there was a huge reward (my daughter). 

Betty

[em]

strangest procedure thus far related to HIV

may not be child birth but may have been the closest thing A guy can get to it

that was not a long time ago

kidney stones they had tested them and said they were made out of Norvir?

I had been on it for about 16 years. originally I was taking four  pills in the morning and four pills at night then they changed into  a much smaller dose with some other pills to take with the Norvir so a lot of Norvir went through my body over many years. SO if you are taking it now it works I just did not drink enough fluids to keep the drug going through my body and some of it clogged the works 

Removing the stone that had blocked the tube between the kidney and  bladder then placing a stent ( a tube to prevent the scar tissue created from removing the stone from stopping the flow between bladder and kidney) .   That was not that bad cause I was out cold with anesthesia  and do not remember anything. just waking up and then telling me to pee and peeing this bloody red and lumpy  urine and them saying that it was a good sign that I was able to pee ?? they said just before discharge if my pee looked like tomato soup to come back in right away the stone was only about ten mm but that was enough to clog the connection between the kidney and bladder. what they did and how they did it I do not know. But i do know I do not have any entry scars from this procedure. I still have other stones but they will hopefully go away on there own they do an ultrasound every year to check them and they are getting smaller.

What was bad was the removal of the stent. They said sit in this strange chair. He said pull down your pants he used some local anesthesia and lidocaine fluid lubrication injected into were a guy pees from  then stuffed a strange long tool   through my stuff and into my urethra into my bladder then grabbed the stent with this a pincer like tweezers   on the end of the tool that was shown on the viewing screen taken by the  camera lit up by the light on this strange tool. A swiss army knife of medical equipment he some how managed to stuff into and through my ( male sexual organ aka groin  ) He then yanked pulling this tool and the large long tube out of my body.

It did not hurt so much dew to the stuff he used to numb everything as it did scare   me out of my mind that this was happening to my body. He did it quickly thank god cause having that thing stuffed inside of me was not on my bucket list of things to do,

[flashdance]

Oh, my ... !!

War Stories..? My version...not really HIV related but

-1- For a hernia...I selected to have a spinal for my anesthesia...similar to what a birthing mother may go through...but then I was never instructed to raise my head for 24 hours after the procedure.....OMG....the procedure went fine but then recovery sent me back into the hospital for a week because I did not remain horizontal for 24 hours. So THE HEADACHE...egads...and the vomiting....that was hell.

-2- I was given a local for the removal of a benign melanoma on my face...just a spot...but then the surgeon...stretched and stretched my skin to seal me back up. I thought my nose was going to be angled to my right ear for the rest of my life. Luckily...painkillers and some repeated tokes made my life better.     

[Wade]

War stories....Hmmm
My worst were my 2 knee replacements . I also had spinals for both and the
surgeries went well and I was up and walking the next day in the hospital but
it was not with out pain. To be honest looking back the constant pain I lived with for years was worse so it was all worth it.

Second on the bad list was having bi-lateral hernias repaired, there were large incisions and my business was swollen and looked like the Bride of Frankenstein.
Shame I was in too much pain to use it...
Enough for one day...lol

[Buckmark]

It's so hard to choose... maybe it was the 10  lumbar punctures (spinal taps) I had during chemo.  Or maybe it was the 2 bone marrow biopsies.  I think the bone marrow biopsies are the winner.

Modern medicine is a miracle, but no one ever said it was pain-free.

Cheers,

Henry

[LongTimeSurvivor]

Already listed the first and second most painful procedures I went through in some of my other posts. Coming in a close third are pudendal nerve block shots. Had to have an operation on my lower large intestine and rectum when I was 19 and in college. The doctor decided he could do the procedure in his office so he would only deaden the area that was to be operated on.

Well I'm laying where with my butt up in the air (I can hear the snickers) waiting to get what I thought would be something close to a regular shot. Similar to what the dentist would do when deadening my mouth for him to drill and inflict other atrocities on my teeth.

But noooooo...first shot goes in. I think the needle was at least an ⅛ inch wide. Then began the extremely slow progress into the area surrounding my bowels. The needle had to be at least 12 inches long. And the doctor made sure I felt every...single...inch. This was then followed by 5 more shots of similar width, length and duration. I believe the doctor wouldn't even of had to inject anything because after those six slow-paced punctures I was left in such a state I don't think I would even have noticed had he cut off my legs.

The only, and I mean only, upside to this whole disaster is once the medication was injected I no longer felt that particular needle. Too bad it didn't do anything about the next five.

So that's my addition to the "most painful medical procedures and AMA sanctioned torture" I have endured.

[BJ010891]

I had full blown aids in 1998 and they did hundreds of tests on me trying to find out what was causing my high fevers I had less than ten t-cells so they did a bone marrow test the Doctor can in with this huge needle he told me to lay on my side and then told me not to move as he hammered that needle into my hip bone I didn't no I could still scream but I'm sure everyone in the hospital could hear me then the next day they did a spinal tap and I never felt a thing it was a different doctor and he was great because everyone told me how painful it would be now if they want to give me another bone marrow I'd rather die.But I keep going thinking it can't get worse but I have to laugh it does now its another colonoscopy because of some cells they found in my stool I'm really running out of supper glue.