--though I'm sorry for the situation that got you here.

Unfortunately, a lot of people who've had nerve biopsies have had more or less permanent problems in the area--pain, numbness, scarring, and the like. Sometimes, these recede over time to more tolerable levels, but I don't know too many who've said they're temporary.

A lot of the severity seems to be the skill of the surgeon--the people with the best results seem to have had the procedure done by actual surgeons, as opposed to neurologists.

Many people have turned down nerve biopsies unless convinced that there was likely to be diagnostic yield. The conditions that are most likely to be revealed by this procedure are vasculitic/connetive tissue autoimmune neuropathies, certain other inflammatory neuropathies, some hereditary disorders, and some toxic reactions with specific nerve damaging characteristics. Muscle samples are usually taken at the same time, in order to look for other neuromuscular conditions.

See:

http://neuromuscular.wustl.edu/nother/bx.html

Also, feel free to come over to the peripheral neuropathy board here, (if you haven't already):

http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/fo...sprune=-1&f=20