Surgery can be used as a life saving medical intervention and although it is necessary, it’s still a foreign concept to our bodies. When you undergo a procedure you will have surgeons dealing with your organs and putting immense pressure and stress on your tissues. After the surgery has been completed, it is expected that you will feel some type of pain or discomfort, depending on the severity of the procedure. Understanding post-operative pain can help you to manage it and know when to seek additional medical help if it gets worse.

During your surgery there will be cuts to your skin and organs, which stimulate the nerve endings that are responsible for sending pain signals to your brain. Once you have been taken off of anesthesia, these nerve endings won’t be numbed anymore and can begin firing pain signals as your body heals. It is normal for someone to feel some discomfort after a surgery, but intense pain could be as a result of an infection elsewhere, a collection of bodily fluid below the skin, or a break in the sutures used to close the surgical field.

When you start to think about the pain that you’re feeling after your surgery you’ll want to consider the type of pain, where it is, how long it lasts, how severe it is, whether it moves from one place to another, or if movement makes it worse. If the discomfort you are feeling is above what your surgeon told you to expect, you should seek medical help immediately.

There are several tests that your doctor may conduct if you’re experiencing heightened levels of pain after a procedure. Physical examinations are quite common, as they will want to see the affected area to determine if there are any physical signs of infection. You may also be required to take blood tests to determine if your white or red blood cell counts are high and to determine your level of electrolytes. Patients are typically asked to take x-rays as well to rule out other conditions that could develop as a result of surgery such as pneumonia or obstructions in the bowels.

The majority of patients will be prescribed painkillers at a particular dose that is recommended for the type of pain they are experiencing. These can include strong opiates like co-codamol which combines 30mg of codeine phosphate with 500mg of paracetamol to make a really strong painkiller. You can by co-codamol 500/30mg here. This is a really good RX platform that connects you to EU pharmacies and doctors. For those with liver issues who can’t tolerate paracetamol, they also offer Brufen which is a combination of 30mg of codeine with 400mg of ibuprofen. In the event that your pain medication is not helping you through the post-operative recovery process, talk to your doctor, as it could be a result of post-op complications.