Unfortunately we received some bummer news yesterday. Lori went to the orthopedic doctor for xrays and check up. Although the muscle and skin graft are doing quite well, the bones do not seem to be healing on their own. The two breaks are still quite clear, so the doctor is starting a bone stimulator which will be worn on Lori's lower leg, and will hopefully trigger the body to begin repairing the bone again. It is unknown what has caused this. The doctor commented that with this severe of a break it could be the lack of blood flow to that area, or the fact that Lori's body was giving all efforts to the muscle and skin and the bone basically got the back seat, simply the chemo could have played a factor or all of the above. No matter the reason, we are hopeful that the stimulator will work (works about 50-60% of the time). After 6 weeks time of the stimulator, the doctor will redo xrays to determine the next step. If the bone does not repair, a bone graft will be required. This involves another surgery (ugh!) to remove bone from Lori's hip, and lifting the muscle and skin graft to graft the bone underneath (ick!). We are hoping and praying this won't be necessary, but nonetheless it's still 6 more weeks of waiting and patience!
Here's the xray from yesterday where you can see the two breaks - one very obvious about midway up and the other is just above the horizontal metal plate. Notice the resemblance to ... say The Terminator???
