Post op fever

Just spoke with the doctor, didn't realize that it was common for postoperative patients to have fevers.

Yes, it is common for post-op patients to have low grade fevers.

I suppose ,logically ,you think of all the foreign bodies that enter the body from a GSW.As well as the bullet/pellets themselves you also have skin,clothing and anything else that got in the way of the bullet so it wouldn't be that surprising to have an infection of some kind.

Yeah I am sure you already got the answer to this, but it is pretty common. Although 39.4 seems a bit higher than most, but that could be due to the nature of the injuries I guess.

I think its because of the bodies initial inflammatory response to the surgery. But doing an IS sometimes really helps with the temp, but I am not sure exactly why it helps with it to be honest.

The patient's wound was pretty traumatic, he did have to have part of his right lung removed.

Yup something with relaxing of lungs under anesthesia.. nothing lots of IS and walking won't cure. So maybe part of lung removal has more play into it being higher just more of a response.

Forgot to add that the patient is intubated so no IS for him.

Most common causes of fever post operatively include anesthesia reaction (rare, early), atelectasis (common), DVT/PE. Two or three days after surgery, pan culture. First 48 hours, it is something else.

Hi

The bodies response to trauma, blood products during surgery and invasive procedures like chest tubes etc can all cause fever immediate post-op. They also do a lot of third spacing immediately post op----

5W's of post op fever:

Walk ( are they OOB and ambulating)

Wind ( Are they using IS)

Water( dehydrate)

WOund( infected)

Wonder Drugs

Easy to remember and try to find the cause of post op fever