I'm sorry you've had difficulties with hospitals. My trial and the permanent implant were done at a surgery center as outpatient. I don't know why one would have to be admitted for either procedure. Do you like the surgeon? Do you have experience with him/her in the past?

I never met the surgeon until I was in the little cubicle pre op, and have never seen him since then. I won't be having him do anything else for me. I should have done some research. Maybe that wouldn't have helped.

The hardest thing for me was having to do next to nothing for 6 weeks after the implant. I had no pain to speak of. I'm thin, so there's no cushion to pad the generator and even now, two years later, it can be a little uncomfortable lying on that side, or sitting in some chairs. It doesn't hurt at all. I had the doctor put it on the left side of my back, above the belt line.

Is it possible to look at other surgeons who would do it outpatient and not in a hospital?

One thing that disturbs me is that an Abbott tech is the only one who sees me whenever I need to have the generator adjusted. I've read that in some cases either a doctor or a nurse is always present, and if I had it to do over again, I'd ask a lot more questions, and probably interview any doctors in the area who do the procedure.

I read in the literature from St. Jude that occasionally a patient might spend the night after the implant, but it certainly wasn't necessary in my case. St. Jude was the originator of the Burst DR stimulator, and soon after I got mine, Abbott took it over. I chose the Burst DR because it advertised that it's MRI compatible. Well, that isn't quite true. I went to get an MRI a few months ago and the controller said "MRI not advised". I am not happy about that. Supposedly the company is working on an update that will make it MRI compatible, but it's taking them a lot longer to do that than the tech promised. The neurologist wants to see a brain MRI that's higher resolution than ones I've had in the past.

I guess my lesson is to better learn patience.

Jim

What preparation was required? I've had two trials and two implanted. My second implant I had problems because of the Jackson table and the throwing around of my body. I did spend two nights in the hospital.