--full nerve cell death in often associated with pretty severe symptoms: complete numbness, lack of propriception or positional sense, even lack of motor response or movement control.

Often, though, cell death is patchy and incomplete and neighboring cells can take over much of the function.

And because of this, myelin and axonal damage are considerably more common than the death of the cell body--neuropathies are much more common than neuronopathies. When recovery does not occur it is usually because the pathologizing cause of the situation hasn't been arrested and is still ongoing.

Fortunately, if your neuropathy is chemotherapy induced, you actually have a pretty good chance of at least partial recovery once the chemo is completely stopped. Many of the most common chemotherapy drugs are notoriously neurotoxic (although not a lot of oncologists mention this up front), but as neuropathies go, chemo-induced neuropathies have a better track record than most, especially if you can do supportive supplementation--Vitamin B12 and essential fatty acids (EFA's) especially, and some people report good results with things like coenzyme Q10 (Cq10).

this is very helpful information. thank you very much again. i am already taking b12 but i will try to add EFAs and Q10 to it.

as you seem to have much better knowledge than my neurologist, may I ask you another question: would you recommend to take lyrica in the meantime or what do you think about it?

I have just started to take it 5 days ago (without any impact up to now anyhow) but since it influences the nervous system I am wondering whether it has negative (or even positive) impact on a) the potential healing of the nerves and b) nerve protection during chemo. my neurologist said it has no impact but I would be interested in your opinion.

i hope i do not bother you too much with all my questions but this is very valuable for me

lyrica is used for pain, it wont help your nerves to heal or protect them from chemotherapy. another supplement taken by people undergoing chemotherapy and which seems to have success for helping to prevent and ameliorate damage to peripheral nerves is aceyl l carnitine.

Thanks for the info. I found the following article about acetyl-l-cartine for chemotherapy. the results are rather mixed. what do you think?

Acetyl-l-Carnitine Yields Mixed Results for Chemo-Induced Neuropathy – Oruen

it seems to have helped for people i talked to who tried it during and/or after chemo therapy but thats only anecdotal evidence. I know a lot of people who have gotten cancer in the last few years

glanntaj, have you ever recommended inosine?

I have recommended Inosine and Sphingolin for this damage. Do a search on them and I've taken both at the same times and now only taking Inosine. Not a cure what is?