Any Moms Have Experience with Hypospadias?

My son had that, we opted for surgery, but at 6 mths. He came thru great. The only thing is changing the diapers. That part can be a little tricky. We had an adult friend who "broke" his goods by pushing it down one morning, so we did not want to take a chance that our little guy could do that. My son looks great now. He is almost 12 and you can't even tell.

Hi J.,
I am a RN at a children's hospital and work in Cardiovascular surgery but have spent some time working in Urology as well. I would just like to tell you that it is a very safe and short procedure. I definately understand that no mother wants to put her child under anesthesia but it will be better for your son in the long run. I would highly recommend getting it done!
K.

My son had surgery for mild hypospadias at 5 months. We used Dr. Clanton Harrison who said to me, as he took our son to surgery, "I'll treat him like he's my own son." Can't say enough great things about the doctor.

Our son is now 5 and has no residual issues.

Good luck with your decision!

My son has had 5 surgeries as a result of his hypospadias. I read the other responses to your post and it sounds like our experience has been an unusual one. Not to make you more uncomfortable about it...but I thought I would share.

The surgeries themselves have been alright. No problems with anesthesia except for the expected nausea and irritability when he woke. The recovery however was not as smooth as we expected. They just told us to give him tylenol for any discomfort. But after his catheter was removed he was in terrible pain every time he urinated...tylenol was clearly not enough. We thought something was wrong becuase noone told us he would be in pain at all. (I'm sure we should have expected it because it does make sense. But I still thought we should have been told because it was so severe.) After contacting the on-call Dr. we were assured that this much pain was normal. We got codeine from his pediatrician and that helped a lot.

Like I said, 5 surgeries...he developed a fistula with the initial surgery and has had 3 attempts to correct it. And one emergency surgery to clip sutures because the Dr. pulled the skin too tight and the poor kid could not void his bladder. The surgeon acts like the fistula is a very common side effect of hypospadias surgery and that the position of our son's fistula makes it particularly difficult to fix...no big deal. Of course, it is a big deal to me and I am skeptical and frankly fed up with it all. So, this brings me to a request of my own. I read that you are in the McKinney area. I live in Arkansas and apparently our Dr. is "the guy" to go to in the state. We are shopping for a new surgeon, and have family in Frisco and Richardson. So if you can recommend a surgeon, I would appreciate it!
If you don't want to post all that info on here, I would be happy to give you my email address and we could correspond that way.

Again, I don't mean to make you uncomfortable about the situation. Going by the other responses, it seems we have had some bad luck and some not so great medical care. I just thought I would share.

My brother had this as well as a friend's son. Both went under anestesia under 1 year and had the surgery and both came out just fine. As moms, we worry about every little thing, which is totally understandable, but trust your doctor, your little one will do fine. Plus, it's much better to do it went they are younger and can't remember it. The father of the little boy I know also had it, and his parents waited until he could remember it, and he said he would have much rather that his parents had done the surgery when he had been much younger.

Hi, My son does not have this but I will say Mine was born with a cleft lip and palate and he has had several surgeries starting at the age of 4 months (see photos at www.texascleftconnections.org ) He had one as 4 months, 11 months, 2 yrs, 3 yrs and will have another this november at 4 years old... so I will say I have experience with surgeries. The hardest part is giveing him to the nurse to take him back... but keep your self busy and it goes by faster than you think... Good luck and I hope that was helpful even thought It was not really what you asked about.

A. J
www.texascleftconnections.org

My son was born with a Hydrocele where part of his stomach lining goes down into his scrotum and causes the stomach fluid to go back and forth between the stomach and scrotum making his "little guys" huge, had to have the surgery because it could have caused fertility issues when he was older and could have made it a lot easier for a hernia. He had surgery at 8 months to correct this and he did just fine. We had it done at Medical City Children's, I agree the hardest part was handing him over and giving all of your trust to someone else, but remember that they want your child to be safe. Another thing I thought was good was that they did not do anything like the IV or whatever until he was asleep so that he would not have any pain. My son was better in about a week, the hardest part getting him to sit-up but I could understand that because the incision was right on his "bikini line" so of course it hurt when he sat. Anyway, I just wanted to share my story with you and know that you will be in good hands and your son in God's hands (my father passed away of cancer about 1 1/2 weeks prior to this and because we had the surgery scheduled well before he passed away and we new my father was dying I asked him to watch over his only grandson, so that made me feel better that I knew he was watching over him). Good luck and I will say a prayer for your little guy, but just know that everything will go great!!

Hi,
I haven't had personal experience, but a close personal friend had 2 boys born with this. I suppose that it may be genetic. Her first son had the operation at 6 months and 2nd one at 4 months. She said that at 6/7 months it was harder because her son was a bit more active post surgery and that is why they opted earlier for son #2. Both boys recovered fairly quickly and had no problems afterward.

HTH
K.
Mom to 3, ages 6, 5, 3