Douglas F. Milam M.D.
Urologic Surgery
Overnight Surgical Stay
● All surgical scheduling in Dr. Milam's practice is done by Phyllis. She will speak with you and give you a surgical date and tentative time to be at the admissions office. Most procedures involving an overnight stay or more in the hospital are performed on Wednesday or Thursday in Main Operating Room at Vanderbilt Hospital. Many same day outpatient surgical procedures are performed on Tuesday afternoon at the Cool Springs Surgical Center.
● In addition to the discussions in the office, if you are being scheduled for one of about six surgical procedures that we perform very commonly you will be provided written information about what you can and cannot do in the post-operative period. These documents can be found in the column to the right. If you know the type of surgical procedure that you are likely to need, please check to see if there is a document listed for that procedure. It is often helpful to read over the post-operative instructions before your visit. In any case, please carefully read the post-operative instructions before your surgical procedure!
● Pre-anesthesia testing (VPEC, Vanderbilt Preoperative Evaluation Center) will be scheduled before your surgery date. The purpose of VPEC is to evaluate and minimize your anesthetic and surgical risk.
● Phyllis from our office will call you the day before your surgery with the definitive time to be at the admissions office. We attempt to follow surgical time as closely as possible. Please be aware, however, that many of the surgical problems that we address are not routine. Some cases require more than the usual amount of time. Please be assured that if we do run longer than planned we will do your procedure the same day and if you turn out to have a complex surgical situation, that we will take whatever time is necessary to achieve the best result possible.
● Park in the East Garage off 21’st Avenue on the day of surgery. See the links to maps for further details. From the East garage take the elevator to the admitting desk on the first floor of Vanderbilt Hospital. You will be checked in and shortly a medical technician will bring you back to a room in the holding area where you will meet the nurse who will be assisting you. Your family may accompany you to the holding room. While in holding you will dress in a gown, vital signs will be taken, an IV will be started and your nurse will ask you a number of standard questions. Depending on your surgical procedure, intravenous medication may be administered. At this point you will meet a member of my surgical team. This may be a resident or fellow. They will also ask you standard questions and may mark the surgical site if we are to operate on something other than a midline structure. The surgical team member will ask you to sign a surgical consent form. Our expectation is that all of your questions were answered when you met with us in the office. However, if you do happen to have a remaining question, please feel free to ask the member of the surgical team. They will contact Dr. Milam if they do not know the answer.
● When the operating room is ready, you will be transported to the appropriate room on a gurney. Your family will wait in the waiting room on the first floor of Vanderbilot Hospital. Once anesthesia is complete and Dr. Milam is finished with your operation, you will be transported to the recovery room. Families cannot visit patients in the recovery area since multiple patients are being treated in an acute care setting.
● When your operation is complete, Dr. Milam will call the waiting room in order to speak with family. Patients remain in the recovery room for about 1.5 hours. After speaking with Dr. Milam, the time period while the patient is in recovery is often a good time for family members to obtain food or a snack. They should be back in the waiting room in about 1 hour.
Copyright 2010-2015 Milam Urology. All rights reserved.