Ryan's Accident

I know I have not been blogging much lately but there are a few family members and friends out there that do not use facebook so I just wanted to update those people with what is going on.

Last Wednesday afternoon Ryan had a terrible accident at work. He was using the table saw and near the end of his cut the cork tile got stuck, or twisted and kicked his hand back through the table saw cutting off 4 or his fingers and a piece of his thumb.

He has working down in Deloriane that day to was rushed to the Deloraine hospital. At that point they called me to tell me what was happening. He was then rushed by ambulance to the Health Science Centre in Winnipeg. It was not till 5 hours after the accident that Ryan's parents and I finally got to see him.

What we found out when we got the hospital was that it was his right hand and that there was little chance they could reattach the fingers. When plastics arrived they explained to us that because or where the cut was on his fingers reattaching was not really an option. He said that if they did reattach the fingers would be useless and would just kinda hang there and they would be extremely painful. He said that 90% of the time when they reattach fingers like that they have to remove them within the first year anyway. So it was decided to just close off what was left without reattching.

It was a very long night sitting by his bedside. He was in incredible pain for about 6 1/2 hours from the time of the accident until they finally gave him enough drugs that he fell asleep. Both his parents and I sat by him while plastics closed up what was left of his fingers. They fixed the tendons in his thumb and skin graphed it as well, so once he heals up he should have full use of his thumb; it will be weaker but it will work. The entire process took over 3 hours but luckily Ryan slept through most of it.

That night he had a pretty good sleep. The next morning there was a lot of pain. The doctors wanted to switch him over just to t3s but after trying it once he was then pumped full of Fentanyl & morphine. Eventually they decided that they would put him on Percocet (Oxycodone & acetaminophen). Once he could just take that orally he would be allowed to leave the hospital. Thursday was very up and down but Ryan was determined to get out of the hospital. He was so strong and by 6:30pm they released him. I would not let him go back to Brandon that night so we all stayed in a hotel incase anything happened.

Besides experiencing some intense pressure pains in the middle of the night he did great so Friday we brought him home.

So far Ryan has been in incredible high spirit. I am just so shocked and amazed at how he is couping. I think a part of it is that the shock has not really worn off and it has not really hit us but for now we are playing it hour by hour and that is working for us.We have been receiving so many kind words from family and friends and I can see how that is helping him. It is so good to have those email and messages to read when he turns on the computer. So those of you that are sending them please keep it up.

Monday will be a very challenging day. We are back at plastics and occupational therapy. He is going to have his hand unwrapped so they can look at the skin graph. I am worried about this because Ryan has not actually seen his hand since they sewed it all up. In order to close the skin around his fingers they had to cut more length off of the bone so his fingers are actually shorter than when the accident happened. I think that the first time he sees it is going to be hard. Also it is just going to be extremely painful to have everything unwrapped and them touching and moving the fingers. Then he has to have a custom splint made. The reason for the splint is to hold his thumb out and not let it move or he will ruin all their work they did with his tendons, as well as to keep him fingers protected.

Ryan has about a 1/2 inch of length left on his pinky and ring finger, his middle finger is a little bit longer, and his index finger is the longest. They stiched it closed just below the first knuckle. They explained to us that there are things they can do in the future to give him more use. They can cut down the webbing between the thumb and index finger to give him more area to grasp. They can also take one of his toes and attach it to his finger to give him a longer finger and a better pinch.

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