Problems removing port

josiemac
josiemac Member Posts: 27
edited March 2014 in Breast Cancer #1
Hi everyone...
I'm happy to report that my 3 month checkup was perfect. I want to thank everyone on the board for all the encouragement and support. We are all sisters in this fight and we all have this common battle. My question is for my sister who tried to have her port removed. (Both she and I were diagnosed). She's a 5 year survivor and her port was beginning to annoy her so she tried to have it removed and it was "stuck" to her. Apparently her tissue grew around it and now she must have major surgery to have it removed. Has anyone had this problem?

Comments

  • pansylover
    pansylover Member Posts: 80
    #2
    CONGRATS on the good checkup!
    I didn't have a problem removing my port..mine decided to break..so it was ANOTHER wonderful surgery..to take the old one out and fetch the broken piece and then replace it w/ a new port. i have heard that tissue will grow around the port....
    ((hugs))
    Cindie
  • Susan956
    Susan956 Member Posts: 510
    #3
    Happy Dance for your clean 3 month checkup.

    I have never heard of a problem removing a port. How long did your sister have the port in? I am getting lined up to get mine out this fall. It will have been in for about 18 months. Hopefully it will go well.

    Hope things go well with your sister.

    God Bless.

    Susan
  • prayerangel
    prayerangel Member Posts: 147
    #4
    I had some trouble with the removal of my port. It was removed in the doctors office (big mistake). I was given 7 local anestetic shots to the area, because I kept feeling him cutting it out. My tissue had grown around it, and he had to cut it out. I almost fainted at one point. I asked to have it back (I have a little breast cancer "museum" going on) and he had to cut off the tissue and clean it up.
    I think I should have been given something more than local shots, something to relax me, or knock me out for a little bit of time, like when you go for a colonoscopy.
    Best of luck,
    Karen
  • mc2001
    mc2001 Member Posts: 343
    #5
    Hi Josiemac,
    I am happy to hear about your great medical report! Congratulations. About your sister's port: this is common. If a port has been inside our bodies for a long period of time, tissue will grow around it. It is fairly easy to remove, and the surgery will be done under local anesthesia and maybe some heavy sedation. This happened to me. The surgeon will more than likely cut through the existing scar so there won't be new incisions and scars. God bless.
    -Michael
  • KathiM
    KathiM Member Posts: 8,028 Member
    #6
    Hello, dearheart....your post could not have been more timely....had my consult with my general surgeon Friday...to remove my port! She knows the man who put it in....she said she had to remove it thru a surgical proceedure, because he sutures them to the facia and then also attaches the tube running up to the vena cava...
    Thanks for the heads up...I had been prepared, before your post and the responses, to go in and have it removed in the office...sigh...the last vestige of my battles with the beast...I WANT IT GONE...now I have to wait till 9/26...her first surgical opening....
    Hugs, Kathi
    PS----NAKED HAPPY DANCE for the perfect checkup!!!! And for sister for 5 years!!!!! What FANTASTIC NEWS!!!!!!

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