Surgery: Coming to a Theater Near You

Alright! So I met with Dr. Joel Solomon at OHSU. Dr. Solomon is the Brachial plexus specialist here in Portland, with lots of experience in Thailand

He is strongly recommending surgery. With a BP injury there are two camps. Camp number one is the body will heal with time. Camp Number two is "you need an operation". I am firmly in the "you need surgery" camp. Here is what he is planning on doing.

1) Brachial plexus exploration to find ruptures and perform grafts. Identify possible avulsions

2) Ulnar nerve transfer to bicep

3) Phrenic nerve transfer to the shoulder (axillary nerve)

Thats pretty cool all the things that they can do with nerves. It's going to be kind of like re wiring me. Dr. Solomon says that with surgery there is a 70-80% chance that I can regain bicept flextion and shoulder abduction. My surgery is scheduled for Aug 15th.

Nervous as hell

I'm going in to see Dr. Solomon today as mentioned in my last post and I am super nervous. Last night I slept a grand total of 3 hours. I'm really not sure what to expect and the suspense is killing me.

So I'm here at work getting exactly nothing done. Pretty much just waiting till 2.

A More Specilized Specilist

Specialist Consult

This morning I met with Dr. Francisco Soldevilla the Neurosurgeon specialist on my case. It quickly became apparent that the Brachial Plexus is not his specialty and he didn't have any strong ideas about what to do next. He's giving the wait and see. I'm really all about what can we do.

Specialized Specialist Time

We agreed to that it's now time, or past due, that I see a Brachial Plexus neuro specialist. So after frantic phone calls this morning and trying to get the workers comp insurance people to buy off on this course of action I am going in for an super MRI at Siker Medical tomorrow morning and then going to see Dr. Joel Solomon at OHSU who has a lot of BP experience.

Also I'm still pursuing Mayo. We'll see what happens now.

Well that pretty much sucks

So this pretty sucks. There's not really any other way to put it. One of the very first things out of the neurologist when I saw him on Monday was "has anyone talked to you about surgery". The EMG test revels "mild denervation of the biceps and triceps" Thats the first time ant one has mentioned surgery as a serious option. Dr. Ash wasn't very forth coming with what this all mens except that its not good (read bad or significantly less progress than expected). It seems like every time I get good news it is imeaditally tempored or in this case crushed with bad. The roller coaster ride is killing me.

Monday I have a surgical consult with the neurosurgeon. I'm trying to get in on Thursday because I don't want to deal with this news through the weekend. Also I am looking at going to Mayo Clinic in Rochester as apparently the have the best or one of the best brachial plexus clinics in the US

Heres are some information on the surgical options available

10 to 22 to 48 going for 95

Over the course of my recovery I take these semi-random tests. The occupational therapist has me do a right hand grip strength test about every month. With my left hand I have about 95 lbs of grip strength. Two and a half months ago my right hand was 10 lbs, June 12th it was 22lbs and today I got 48lbs. SWEET!!!

Those of you who are mathematically inclined will immediately notice that my grip strength has doubled about ever month. Thats a x^2 recovery rate (for grip strength at least) Wooo Hooo.

Final note: Today I have a EMG test (test nerve conduction and other nerve electrical test stuff). I'll let you know how it goes.