Quote:
Originally Posted by Karen B
I touched on this in another post, but I would love to hear as many thoughts as possible. I am struggling with my choice.
To summarize:
*no remissions for 1 year now
*pain every time I eat, drink and on bad days when I talk
*in my 20's
*pain is manageable thanks to Lyrica (225mg), botox and capsaicin cream
*Typical TN
*pain lasts a couple of seconds, but I get zapped hundreds of times a day
*no obvious cause on my CT scan
I can cope, but it is draining. Because I do not have an obvious compression my neurologist wants me to have a RF rhizotomy instead of MVD. I am afraid of anesthesia dolorosa as a side effect of the surgery. I am pain free at night and do not want to lose that. But to even reduce the pain by surgery would be lovely. I feel torn about what to decide; take things as they are now and try to be happy, or hope that surgery is a success.
Any insights, thoughts, stories would be very much appreciated!
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I posted a link on here a while back which featured Dr. Casey talking about the current thinking regarding surgery. If you haven't watched it before, it could be beneficial to you now. Here is the link to it:
http://vimeo.com/10284243 Its about 2 hours long so allow a good amount of time to view it. There is a lot of info in it regarding when to go for surgery.
Best of luck to you in making your decision. ee