:p Wolf-many who have had their gall bladders removed will tell you it is no big deal. I thought that but was I wrong. Had the surgery after an extremely painful episode of trying to pass a gall stone. Woke up after surgery just fine but with 24 hours I was ina coma in the intensive care ward diagnosis "SEPSIS" Took 5 moinths before I got out of hospital. Could barely stand or walk. of physical therapy to restore me. Avaid surgery if at all possible.

Welcome to the Cellar, Telephonics.:)
Did they ever figure out what triggered the Sepsis? Of course any surgery is dangerous, but this sound pretty extreme.

Bruce--A major threat to a patient in a hospital is the threat of staph infection. It is virtuallu impossible to kill this bug and as a result you hear the phrase that hospitals are a threat to ones health. The Docs recognize this fact and that explains why they try to get their patients discharged as quickly as possible. There is no way to discern how I got the bug. In any event I remained ina coma for 6 weeks and when I woke I lived on intravenous feedings and as a result I lost 54 pounds. Of course that's all back plus some more. Maybe I shopuld go on intravenous feeding again for a while. I realize how lucky I was since the morbidity associated with Sepsis is very high. Good luck to you-just be careful.

When I was 15, I cut my knee on a piece of farm equipment. We were working so fast and hard, I didn't notice it until I started to walk away and my shoe was full of blood. They wrapped a brown paper bag and baleing twine around it and on the way home after work, I stopped at the Doctors and got some stitches.
It was sore but OK, for 5 days, but woke up the sixth with it grotesquely swollen and painful. Doc cut it open to relieve the pressure and put me in the hospital for 10 days. The said I had blood poisoning and a staph infection. I guess the wound being at the extremities rather than a traumatic hole in the abdomen, was in my favor.
I know they weren't happy that I can't take penicillin, and they kept me in isolation for the first 5 days.
Wouldn't recommend it for a diet plan, though.:)

You are a very lucky man.

Tele, I was very lucky with regards to my own surgery, but I am no stranger to post surgical infection. My mother had hernia repair surgery several years ago that resulted in her being rehospitalized with a raging case of e. coli and some other nasty bug I forget the name of. Luckily she responded to antibiotics, though.

Very sorry to hear about your experience.