That is a common misconception. Doing "well" or not doesn't determine whether you have rsd or not. If you get some pain relief from a block it means your pain is still SMP,sympathetically maintained. If you don't, it means your pain is now SIP, sympathetically independent. What happened to you, well the pain part, is what happened to me. My shot up to 20+ for 2 veeeerrrryyyy long months! I sure hope that's not the case with you. The swelling might have been a reaction of some kind to one of the meds in the block or just a reaction to the block itself. I think the heightened pain happened to me because my body saw it as an intrusion and it "excited" and aggravated my nervous system.

The good news is it shouldn't stay that way. Obviously you shouldn't get any more blocks because they won't help. Sorry you had to go through that!

Hugs,

Karen