Your Heart Surgery Recovery Questions Answered

If you’ve been told you need to have heart surgery, you probably have a lot of questions. How much is it going to hurt? How quickly can I get back to regular activities? Will I ever be back to my normal self post-procedure?

It’s important to remember that not everyone will heal at the same rate, but learning about the recovery process prior to surgery can be very beneficial to healing. Christopher Riordan, MD, FACS, a cardiothoracic surgeon at ProMedica, provides tips for heart surgery recovery.

Preparing for the Procedure

In some instances, open heart surgery can be a scheduled procedure. If this is the case, setting yourself up for success pre-surgery can greatly impact your recovery. A few ways to reduce the risk of complications due to surgery include quitting or reducing smoking, improving nutritional habits and ensuring current medical conditions, like diabetes, are under control.

“Stopping smoking or cutting back before surgery is very important,” says Dr. Riordan. “It dramatically decreases the potential for lung complications after the procedure.”

According to the American College of Surgeons, quitting smoking four to six weeks before an operation and staying smoke-free four weeks post-operation can decrease the rate of wound complications by 50%.

“Part of our job as surgeons is to work with the patient’s doctors to try to optimize current conditions to ensure a better procedural outcome and recovery,” says Dr. Riordan. “For example, if a patient is diabetic and their blood sugar has been out of control, we will work with the patient’s care team to get the patient’s diabetes under control before surgery. Doing this can help with post-surgical wound healing and can prevent wound infections.”

Will it hurt?

The pain associated with open heart surgery is one of the most common concerns patients express to their surgeons.

“The pain that patients anticipate following surgery is dramatically worse than the reality,” says Dr. Riordan. “Open heart surgery tends to hurt a lot less than most other major procedures. The degree to which the muscle is cut during surgery dictates how much soreness there will be. A lot of open heart surgeries only cut through minimal muscle, reducing the soreness felt post procedure.”

Knowing the pain associated with open heart surgery ahead of the procedure can help to alleviate fears and anxiousness.

“It’s really important patients know about the pain level ahead of surgery because if they’re anxious about how much they are going to hurt, they tend not to get up and moving as quickly as they should in recovery, which can slow recuperation.”

How long is recovery?

Recovery times for open heart surgery can be dependent on what type of open heart surgery is being performed. Factors include the type of procedure and if the patient has other mobility or health concerns prior to surgery, explains Dr. Riordan.

For an elective open heart procedure, most patients usually spend about four to five days in the hospital. Some patients will go to in-patient rehab, but others will go home immediately.

Upon returning home, unless otherwise noted by the surgeon, patients may resume walking and other light activities, including riding as a passenger in a car. Patients should not lift anything over 10 pounds or do any strenuous activity.

Most patients will be cleared to drive after about three weeks with more strenuous activities being allowed after four to five weeks post procedure.

Minimally invasive surgery does have a quicker recovery time. It is important to listen to your body while recovering. Not everyone heals at the same rate. Staying patient and positive can have a big impact on recovery.

Say Yes to Cardiac Rehab

Cardiac rehabilitation is an important program for patients to consider after having heart surgery. The program is supervised by medical professionals and includes guided physical activity, education on how to live a heart-healthy life and ways to strengthen the heart and body to help reduce symptoms of heart disease.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), studies have found that cardiac rehabilitation decreases the chance a patient will die in the five years following a heart attack or bypass surgery by about 35%.

“One of the great things about cardiac rehab is that you have medical professionals checking your heart rate, checking your blood pressure and letting you know which exercises are safe at a certain point in your recovery,” says Dr. Riordan. “The level of comfort and confidence in doing a program where there is medical supervision can help patients achieve more quicker.”

Christopher Riordan, MD
Dr. Riordan is a cardiothoracic surgeon at ProMedica. View his profile.