Time off after Prostate Surgery?

Hello-

Thank you for this site. My husband is having robotic surgery the end of this month. He is 66 years old-Gleason 8. The doctor mentioned 6 weeks recuperating usually but we did not discuss what his job is with the doctor yet. He drives a tractor trailer truck and works 14 hours a day stopping to deliver 5 or 6 times.. He lifts very heavy boxes and pushes carts ....jumps in and out of trailer...empties a trailer filled from front to back and top to bottom... etc. We are going to have him take FMLA without pay but still able to keep insurance and I want him to take all the time he needs before going back to work and for it to be noted on the sheet completed for FMLA by the doctor. How long before most can go back to work after surgery and how do you think doing a very physical job will affect that time? It is much different than going back to a desk job.

Thank you for your help.....so thankful for all on this board.

Celia,

Have you explored other treatment options?

What are his stats? The guys who get seeds seem to be back to normal in a week, and a 66 year old would seem to be the sweet spot for that treatment option.

Dewayne-

We asked about seeds because we knew someone who had that done. They said it would not be a good fit for him. He has 2 Gleason 8 areas and the rest are 6 /7. Sorry just learning about all this. They found a nodule during a DRE. His Gleason score is 1.7....He had a bone scan and cat scan last week when we were there and they came back good...not showing the cancer had spread based on those 2 tests. When we go back down they are doing a MRI but we need to meet with the cardiologist there first because he has a pacemaker and cannot do a regular MRI.

Thank you for your help.

Welcome to HW.

My brother who was about 4 years younger at the time of his surgery, took 4 weeks off his physical job. He's on his feet all day but not much really heavy lifting. It's the heavy lifting part that will be a problem post surgery. Most surgeons say, six weeks of healing before lifting and then there is the problem of possible stress incontinence afterwards.

Please check out all the options before doing surgery.

Andrew

I had an incisional hernia ... internally the incision pulled apart and I had a tennis ball sized protrusion ... at about 3 months post surgery. A hernia can be dangerous if the bowel that is poking through the muscle wall becomes strangulated. My hernia required another operation to patch it with a mesh.

I would recommend going very slow with the lifting after the surgery and possibly wear a truss, band or strap of some sort to keep everything together after he returns to work. For his heavy lifting I would think six weeks is a minimum. Talk to the surgeon or a physical therapist, they may have recommendations on how to minimize the possibilities of a hernia.

Can he do the driving and get assistance at the delivery site with the loading and unloading. Possibly through a temp service?

Post Edited (RCS) : 3/1/2015 6:03:09 AM (GMT-7)

Celia,

From the way you describe his job it sounds like he may need more than six weeks to recover after the surgery. I'd ask the doctor to write the form for 8 weeks and if he doesn't need that long he can get the doctor to let him go back early.

As for whether brachytherapy is an option for him that is complicated. With two cores of Gleason 8 disease he is probably not a good candidate for brachytherapy as a monotherapy (all by itself) but he is probably a candidate for combination therapies that include brachytherapy as a component. Most brachytherapy doctors will want to add some external beam radiation to treat the surrounding area outside the prostate and maybe a period of hormone therapy, too. That is a good strong treatment regimen and probably offers as good a cancer control as any treatment available, but by the time he does the brachytherapy and seven weeks of radiation treatments he will most likely miss more work than he would with the surgery. This isn't because he will be laid up and unable to work -- radiation makes a man a little tired but he can usually work through it -- but just because he would need to show up for radiation treatment every day which his truck-driver job wouldn't allow.

Here is a link to a good discussion of low dose brachytherapy. It is a podcast with a couple of doctors from MD Anderson. Brachytherapy for Prostate Cancer.

Near the end they talk about their research to extend the use of brachytherapy (monotherapy) beyond low-risk cancers to include "favorable" intermediate-risk cases. Your husband higher-risk than they are talking about and would need additional treatment beyond just the brachytherapy. Still, since you are going to MD Anderson anyway for more tests you might want to see if you can consult with them about your husband's options.

Thank you all so much. This board is wonderful. I am going to have him request the full amount of FMLA as Celebrate Life suggested. I cannot stand the thought of him not being fully recovered or something happening.

Celia,


I was 58 years old when I had my RP surgery for Gleason 8 disease. I was also a truck driver with very similar job requirements as your husband. During my typical 10 to 12 hour shift I would climb in and out of 20 tractors to fuel, service and reposition for the fleet use. I would also empty/clean 10 to 15 trailers each shift, this required stacking heavy wooden pallets and moving (pushing and pulling) the pallet stacks with a non-powered pallet jack.

During pre-planning with my surgeon I made him aware of the nature of my work. He had no problem requesting two months off for my state disablity insurance. I ending needed 2 1/2 months off work due to a fatigue issue from the surgery.

One additional comment about when I returned to my work duties. While I considered myself dry and continent since the day the catheter was removed, I found during the first week back on the job with strenuous lifting, I wasn't total dry. So keep this in mind for when your husband prepares to return to work and factor where he may think he is in recovery.

TG

Thank you all so much. This is so helpful.