She's spending one night in the hospital, mainly so Physical Therapy can work with her tomorrow before she goes home. It's amazing what the benefits of not having conventional anesthesia are. She's not groggy, she has a full appetite, just ate a very good dinner. She's fully cognizant, two pharmacists just came in to ask about her usual daily meds and she was able to understand and answer all their questions easily, etc. She is beginning to feel a little pain since the nerve block is wearing off, but oral pain meds should handle that.
The difference between this and recovering from full anesthesia is night and day. This orthopedic surgeon has never done anything like this in his 35 years as a surgeon. We might be onto something here.
Necessity is the mother of invention.