Quote:
Originally Posted by Felicia1981
I had a VP shunt placed back in October of 2008, I have since the surgery had short term memory loss, now out of the blue the actual shunt itself is hurting.... it starts out as a "throbbing" then remains... I have experienced the "throbbing" before an thought nothing of it... but earlier yesterday morning I nearly fell from being dizzy an light headed... like I had gotten up to fast, but that was not the case... this was differant. Also, its like the pain is ONLY where the actual shunt itself is, its not a severe pain more annoying than anything...
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> I went to the ER last night mainly because I was scared... this is all new to me... Anyway, to make a long story short the dr was very rude an walked out of the room as I was in mid sentence an then went an hid in a little room down the hall from my room... he ordered a CT Scan but like my primary dr told me, results are only as good as the person trying to read them.... so I am goin to go an get a copy of CT Scan that was done last night an go see a neurologist. ... The second time the dr (what a joke!) came in my room was to give me a Rx for Fioricet and papers on "What is a headache" I was beyond mad! It was because of
> a headache they even did my first CT Scan that showed I have hydrocephalus to begin with....
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> Either way, the shunt still hurts... my short term memory still sucks, still get light headed for time to time an just want to know if anyone else has had this an if so, how was it treated?
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> I just know this isn't normal I guess I feel that I have had the shunt long enough to know now the difference between what is an is not normal for me....
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Well, it seems to me like we have allot in common for sure. In Octor of 2008 I underwent surgery to replace the fixed pressure shunt that had been in my body for nearly 38 years. I was replace with the Medtronics programmable vp shunt and in two weeks thy discovered that I also had high protein levels in my brain as well and needed to install a secon shunt on the left side of my brain too. I soon discovered thoughafter just one month that the doctor did no treplace the whole shunt system when he put the new one in. He just connected the new shunt to the old catheter that had now become stuck to my brain. So, even at a low setting of 1.5 the pain was so intence that in just two months I had to have surgery to remove the shunt he said I needed sooooo bad. I suggested he run a brand new one paralleled to the old one but he said he didn't have to to do the surgery because he was retiring and to find a new surgeon a.s.a.p. Well it took me nearly 18 months and a whole bunch of pain and suffering too, I found a new neurosurgeon that agreed taht indeed I needed two shunts. I had seen at least 10 thers prior to him and they disagreed and left me helpless. Well I now have two of the Medtronics programmable shunts and both hurt really bad and I need to take 54 milligrams of morphine and 32 milligrams of dilaudid as well for the pain. My legs, feet, arms and hands all hurt really bad, and I think that's got something to do with the fact I also have spinal stenosis so it takes me at least one full year to recuperate now do to the spinal cord injury I had back in 2001. Anyway, I'm grateful to be alive and know God has something to do with me being here, I just wish I didn't have to take all the morphine and dilaudid everyday but I guess its become a daily routine like brushing my teeth in order for me to function normally. Check with a pain specialist and see if you could benefit from some type of opiated medication, or something that's drug free as well like neurotin. Good luck to you always.
Sincerely,
Steven J. Esler