Hello?

I'm a 23-year-old male and had calf lengthening surgery in February 2011. I first learned about this surgery in high school, but at the time, I had more negative thoughts about it. In particular, I almost gave up on surgery after watching TV programs like 'I Want to Know That' that highlighted the side effects and aftereffects. However, during my military service, I happened to come across information about Ilizarov on the internet and learned more about it, and I realized that it was different from what I had known before. So, I made a plan to have the surgery after being discharged from the military if I could. I went on leave before my discharge and talked to my parents about it. My parents didn't unconditionally oppose it, but they said to go to the hospital for a consultation and ask people who had the surgery first before making a decision, and eventually, I decided to have the surgery. I think it's important to get the consent of your family because this surgery is difficult not only for the person undergoing it but also for the family who shares the pain together.

Like everyone else, what I considered the most before this surgery was the aftereffects and side effects after the surgery. This was also what my parents were most concerned about. I thought it was useless if I wasn't healthy, no matter how long my legs got and how much taller I became, and I was especially sensitive because I like soccer. Most of the people who had the surgery said that there is a safe range for lengthening the legs, and if you go beyond that range, the risk increases. Most of the people who did it within the stable range were able to do the sports they wanted and live normally. Of course, there were also people who lived well without any problems playing sports like basketball or tennis even with a long extension length. In other words, there seemed to be some individual differences. So, before the surgery, I decided on the length to lengthen my legs with my family and only lengthened it to that length.

1st surgery

After receiving a consultation at the hospital and discussing it with my family, I decided to have the surgery and scheduled the surgery by phone. Before the surgery, I had a preoperative examination at the hospital and was admitted about 3-4 days before the surgery. The surgeries are done on Mondays and Tuesdays, and in my case, it was on Tuesday morning. The surgery was done under general anesthesia, and when I woke up after the surgery, it was about 2 p.m. Both legs were wrapped in bandages, and I was completely out of it. The pain wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, and it was bearable. After about two days, I unwrapped the bandages on my legs, and when I saw the operated legs, I wondered if these were really my legs. Looking at the skin that was drilled with something similar to a drill and pinned and sutured, I thought that this was by no means an easy task and I was a little scared. I couldn't stand properly because I couldn't put any strength in my legs. After the surgery, I went to the sports medicine room, where I did rehabilitation exercises and learned how to use crutches. But after exercising here, I was able to walk without crutches. I was initially scared of my legs, so I couldn't put any strength in them. The external fixator acted as a bone to support my legs, and my muscle strength was still good because it was right after the surgery, so I could walk well if I wasn't scared. And now I started lengthening, 1mm per day. And if you are hospitalized, you will see a lot of people who have had this surgery. Next to me was a guy who had already had calf lengthening surgery and this time had thigh lengthening surgery. I asked him a lot of questions. It is best to become friends with people who have had surgery at the hospital first and get advice. I tend to be shy, but I still asked questions and shared information with each other, and it was very helpful. Now I lengthened for about a week to check if the lengthening was going well, and then I was discharged and went home. And I went to the hospital for checkups every two weeks.

Extension

The purpose of the surgery, leg lengthening, is to increase the length by turning the screw with the dice on the Ilizarov. The dice have numbers from 1 to 4, and turning it around once increases the length by 1mm. The hospital explained that just like a car accident causes a lot of aftereffects because the body is suddenly shocked in a state where it is not prepared, lengthening the legs too much suddenly puts a strain on the body and is not good. I lengthened 1mm per day and 0.5mm per day, and the pain was definitely less when I lengthened less. So, I think it's better to lengthen with some leeway and without putting too much strain on the body rather than lengthening too much. And when you start lengthening, the actual length increased is shorter than the length you lengthened when you take an X-Ray. In my case, there was an error of about 8mm at first. If you take an X-Ray, you can see the bone being filled with white in the empty space, and if you see this, you can see that the bone is being created. In my case, the bone wasn't forming well, so I reduced the lengthening from 1mm to 0.5mm per day at first. The professor said that the bone will form faster if you pull the bone formation along with it. Even if you have lengthened your legs all the way, you cannot remove the external fixator unless the bone has formed to some extent, so it is important that the bone forms clearly even if you lengthen it slowly.

Rehabilitation exercises

Exercise is important even during lengthening. In my case, I walked the most, which not only prevented the weakening of leg muscle strength but also stimulated the bone gap to promote bone formation, so I walked the most. After reading a review written by someone who walked for 2 and a half hours a day, I walked for about 3-4 hours a day. Since the exercise effect is lower than walking by the average person, it is best to walk as much as you can exercise. It's not easy to exercise because you experience pain and your muscle strength weakens as you lengthen your legs. And you must do stretching because the bone is lengthening, but you can feel that the skin, muscles, and ligaments are reaching a certain limit. In particular, if the Achilles tendon ligament reaches its limit, the tiptoe phenomenon occurs where the heel lifts up. If you have tiptoes, it is not easy to walk, so it is difficult to exercise. Therefore, you should pay attention to this part and stretch. It also helps to walk with strength on the Achilles tendon ligament when walking. And you can't straighten your legs. It doesn't hinder exercise as much as tiptoes, but you should stretch often to prevent it. There are many stretching exercises on the internet, and if you ask your doctor, they will kindly tell you effective methods.

Pain

In my case, the pain came alternately in both legs, and when I asked other people, it was similar. If one leg hurt, the other leg was fine. And once the pain started, it didn't last long, and it disappeared after a few days. There were no cases where the pain was unbearable, but when I read other people's reviews, they said that they were in so much pain that they couldn't sleep and could only sleep for an hour or two a day, but I slept well even when I was in pain. If it hurt too much, the pain mostly disappeared if I stopped lengthening. Even in cases of severe pain, massage can help a lot, and taking prescribed painkillers can relieve it to some extent. In my case, I took painkillers to some extent to make it easier to exercise. But I didn't take it regularly, and I only took it when it hurt so much that it was hard to exercise. You should avoid taking a lot of painkillers because you can become resistant to them. There is pain when you move to exercise more than when you are still, especially when you bend your ankle up, which makes it difficult to do tiptoe exercises.

Nutrition

In my case, I especially ate vitamin C and pork rinds for my bones. I don't know the details, but when a bone is created, a mesh-like structure is created first, and calcium sticks to it to form the bone, and I learned that vitamin C and collagen promote it when the mesh-like structure is created, so I am taking vitamin C immediately after every meal. And because vitamin D is important for bones, I went outside or by the window every day for 30-40 minutes of sunbathing when it wasn't raining. It is said that sunbathing for 30-40 minutes a day creates enough vitamin D in the body. (However, in winter, the amount of sunshine is insufficient, so it is not enough with sunlight, and you need to consume it through food or take medicine to meet the vitamin D needed by the body.) If you have surgery and stay at home, there are many times when you don't see the sun. So, even if it's a hassle, going outside or by the window (but sunlight coming through the window is useless) is good for your body and helps you change your mood. And I basically consumed calcium and protein. Among them, I focused on consuming calcium, and if you feel that you are not consuming enough calcium, you can get a prescription for calcium supplements when you get a checkup.

Disinfection & Inflammation

The most important thing to do consistently during the lengthening period after the first surgery is pin disinfection. If you get an infection once, you will have pain and it will not be easy to exercise. And if it gets worse, you may even have to be hospitalized. Therefore, you must disinfect thoroughly to prevent inflammation. You will learn how to disinfect when you are hospitalized in the hospital after the first surgery. The hospital disinfects with alcohol, but if you search on the internet, you can also disinfect with hydrogen peroxide or betadine in addition to alcohol. I disinfected with alcohol one day and with hydrogen peroxide for two days because the skin around the pin became too dry and scaly when disinfected with alcohol alone. I did it with hydrogen peroxide to prevent that. However, I did it with alcohol about once every three days because the principles of disinfection are different. Alcohol has an effect on its own, so it is used for disinfecting equipment and hands, but hydrogen peroxide can only be used on wounds because it needs to meet enzymes in the blood to have a disinfecting effect. Therefore, when disinfecting with alcohol, I disinfected the top of the pin or other surrounding areas. And when you exercise, there will be blood or discharge from the wound, but you don't have to worry too much about it, and if too much comes out, you can use sterile gauze. If you are very worried about inflammation, you can get a prescription for antibiotics before you leave the hospital or when you go for a checkup, and if inflammation starts to occur, you can take it to reduce the inflammation.

Ending the Review

I tried to write as much as I knew in the review while having surgery, and I also received a lot of help by reading reviews written by others, so I hope my review will also be helpful to someone else. What I felt while having surgery was that there is a big difference between seeing and hearing something a hundred times and experiencing it directly. I am not completely finished yet, so I don't think I am in a position to say anything about the surgery.

The most important thing is that the person having the surgery carefully considers it and knows as much as possible beforehand and knows if it is what they wanted. This surgery is definitely not an easy surgery, and you have to pay a certain cost and price to get what you want. Also, if you have surgery, I think you should be prepared to work hard for it. I am grateful just for being able to have the surgery I wanted, and I will work hard to produce good results in the future. I am grateful to many people and hope that others will also get the good results they want.