What happens with renal failure and heart bypass surgery?I am writing a story where a main character is a 86 year old woman with congestive heart failure. She has a massive heart attack and undergoes heart bypass surgery. She then suffers renal failure. Would renal failure be something that would happen while she is on the operating table or would it happen afterwards? If it happens afterwards, how long afterwards? Also, how long is a normal amount of time for her to remain in ICU?
Yahoo and google searches haven't provided me with the answers to these specific questions.
Posted by tim g
http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=renal+failure&fr=ush-ans&ygmasrchbtn=Web+Search
Posted by HollyHobby
The renal failure might occur within 1-2 days, from the heart attack alone. Often, renal failure is caused by a severe drop in blood pressure: the kidneys don't get adequate blood flow, so they get "shocky". The heart attack itself could very well cause full-blown renal failure.
It's somewhat common for kidney function to suffer after bypass surgery, especially in an elderly patient who already had health problems. If the renal failure is caused by the surgery itself (the surgery would be a big shock to an elderly lady's body, so renal failure is a reasonable complication) then you'd expect the renal failure to become obvious within a day or two of the surgery.
The kidneys in an elderly patient could fail at any time after the surgery too. So you could set this up any way you wish, with the renal failure beginning before, during, or after surgery. In any case, it usually takes at least a few days to a week for the renal failure to become severe enough to require dialysis.
As for ICU stay, this varies widely, completely dependent on the patient's condition. A young, relatively healthy person might only be in the ICU for a couple of days after bypass. An elderly lady who is recovering from bypass surgery AND with renal failure could stay in the ICU for a long time, even weeks. Even months.
Feel free to write to me if you need any specific questions answered. I'm an ICU nurse.
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