Re: shunt or not (long), ooops

[Guest guest]

lucia

have you considered the tonsils cauterisation procedure ? the way my doctor

explained it to me , often the tips of the tonsils are dammaged , and

esentially dead tissue just hanging in the way .....even when its still

functional , there is no known use of such , or risk in cauterisation , and

the japanese studys have shown this approach to be very sucessful .

i think of it like a little cattle prod , and with a little jolt

.....(according to the doctor who did my surgery ) , when the tonsils are

proded a tiny bit , they often jump back up some in responce ....i had this

done ( other doctors call it tonsilectomy , much like those in the back of

your throat being removed .)

this seemed to me , a better choice than lamenectomy of c2 ( which the same

doctor said is more likely to lead to instability later ) .....if it matters

, the neurosurgeon i had is Dr Batzdorf at ucla , hes spent the last 30 plus

years studying acm and sm .

i will enclose a link to one of the japanese studys , .....and would be happy

to discuss this further ....i can also tell you , Dr Oro ( currently studing

acm at the university in missouri , uses this same cauterisation approach

when he feels its useful( and dont forget , were talking about a tiny tiny

amount of tissue here , that can well keep things cloged up , one thing that

helped me feel comfortable about this decision !) <A

HREF= " http://www.aans.org/journals/online_j/nov96/1-5-p1.html " >Pathogenesis

of Chiari malformation</A>

im not sure if this is the study that specifically mentions cauterisation , (

im not up to reading the whole thing at the moment ...but it will give you a

better grasp of how the measurements of space available are done , .....and

leads to other studies they have investigated and used in their evaluation of

acm .

best wishes to you ....i can assure you , if my noodle misses that bit of

tissue at all , its greatful its gone , i did improve lots following surgery

!!!

sarah in paradise calif

[Guest guest]

manorrd@... wrote:

> I think that i have come to my decision about which surgery to have,

> since it is possible to place AND remove a shunt, but it is not

> possible to remove and replace part of a vertebrae; I've decided that

> i'm going to get a shunt put in and if that doesn't work then go on to

> the C2 decompression idea.

>

I thought everyone would be interested in what my neurosurgeon said about my

shunt. When I had it place in 1990, my neurosurgeon that did my decompression

didn't think I needed the shunt, his partner did the surgery while the first

surgeon was out of town.

My first surgeon wanted to take it out, and later re thought the issue. To take

a

shunt out would cause more scar tissue. Even if I didn't need it anymore, it is

there to stay. That is unless I should develop an infection.

Having a shunt done because you think you can have it removed is a big mistake.

Kathleen