Sorry to hear that Bang. Im a bit of a youngster but If I was to add my advice the one thing that has helped me out all these years is realizing that things are a huge deal until they happen.
In my own case I've had some surgeries and breakups and crazy stuff like that but I've discovered that the anticipation is always worse than the actual event... so by now I really have a hard time getting worked up over stuff.
An example is my roomie... he got cited to court over some bills he owed (about $10,000) and I told him "you dont know if this is going to be a big deal or a small one, but I garantee that you will be less worried while your sitting on that court room bench". We kept his mind of it and in the end it turned out to be nothing, he was able to clear it for $1,000.
Your wife will need all her strenght for recovery, so worrying the hours in between wont really help. Do what you can to confort her and you know you've got our support and prayers.
Listening to Massive attack - Karmakoma from the Protection album. I highly recomend looking this track up.