Providing you and your wounds have been behaving and you’re making good progress, you’ll very soon be going home.  Say goodbye beige sauna-like hospital, hello old favourite PJs, comfy couch and many a movie to watch.  It’s a great and sometimes a surreal feeling after what you’ve just been through so go easy on yourself and get plenty of rest and enjoy being looked after.  Make sure someone is able to collect you and drive you home if need be (most likely after mastectomy surgery and/or if you’re on heavy duty pain killers).

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Once discharged you’ll have regular outpatient appointments with your Breast Care Nurse within the first few days/weeks to check on your healing and when the output into drains has slowed down to very little, you’ll have them removed as an outpatient. This is by far one of the weirdest feelings you’ll probably ever experience as just under a metre of tubing is quickly pulled out of your insides through the small hole which it entered.  Its not painful – just weird, snaky and a bit queasy.

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With your drains removed you need to keep an eye on area around the scar for any wobbly fluid building up underneath, known as a seroma.  You’ll have regular outpatient appointments with your Breast Care Nurse within the first few days/weeks to monitor this and manually remove any fluid that warrants draining.  If you have any concerns about anything once you’re home – call your Breast Care Nurse straight away.

Anything up to 10 days after your surgery, you’ll have another meeting with your surgeon who’ll give you the low down on the pathology results and chat about what comes next. They’ll also have another quick check of their handiwork and your healing before making a note to refer you on where necessary or make another appointment to see you.