Urinary retention after general anesthesia

[puffynipsman]

I'm having surgery in a couple weeks and will be going under general anesthesia. It's not my preference, and not the preference of many doctors on this board, but I'm okay with it because I've done my research and trust the surgeon. One question, though:

I've only been under general anesthesia once and, for the first 24 hours after surgery, I couldn't pee and had to have three catheters. The surgeon said it was urinary retention from the general anesthesia and that it would wear off. It did, but those catheters were one of the worst things I've ever experienced. I do not want to go through that again. Keep in mind, that surgery was much different as it was two to three hours long and I was in the hospital for three days.

Do you think this is something I'll have to deal with again? Should I call my surgeon's office now to tell them or is it okay to bring it up the day before at the pre-op appointment? I don't want to end up back at home after the surgery and unable to pee.

[DrPensler]

Without question you should always tell your surgeon anything that might be helpful.Urinary retention can occur after surgery particularly after general anesthesia.If you have had urinary retention after surgery in the past you are at increased risk for having the problem again.

[Litlriki]

It is worth telling your surgeon about this beforehand.  It's not likely that he'll do anything different, and as you've observed, this is relatively short surgery, and you should be up and around quickly afterwards, thereby decreasing your risk.  Nonetheless, knowing beforehand might compel the nursing staff to get you moving around sooner afterwards in an effort to avoid the catheter.

Good luck,

Rick Silverman

[puffynipsman]

I just want to follow up in case anyone ever stumbles upon this thread and has a similar concern.

I had surgery last week and the general anesthesia went off without a hitch. I was able to urinate the first time I tried, which was within an hour of waking up.

I did talk to one of the nurses a week before the surgery and she talked to an anesthesiologist about it. He told her that there wasn't much he could do other than hope it didn't happen again. He added that it's not something he'd experienced in patients without a history of urinary retention prior to surgery, so he wasn't sure how to explain it in my past operation.