Re: surgery

[Barb_MSN <Barb_MSN@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Chris....

I had a successful\ul unilateral pallidotomy on October 24, 1994 -
that's five years of NOT HAVING A SINGLE  *EXTERNAL" PD SYMPTOM on
my entire right side!

Since I had just begun  having PD symptoms on the other side (the
left and my primary side as I'm a left) I was pleasantly surprised
to find that the surgery for the RIGHT side of my body ALSO gave
me a FOUR YEAR REPRIEVE by causing a "remission" of all external
PD symptoms on the side of my brain that DIDN'T get operated on.

>From my personal research, and from speaking with dozens of people
with Parkinson's who have had pallidotmies, I've found that MOST
benefit enough from the surgery to consider it better to have had
the surgery than to not.

I wouldn't opt for a second pallidotomy when my left side symptoms
eventually disrupt my life enough to cause me to seek out surgical
intervention because with a bi-lateral pallidotomy there's a
heightened chance of running into speech and.or vision problems
that MAY happen (but not in every case, so that becomes a judgment
call for the PD patient and his/her doctors

It should be stated that in the five years since I had my
pallidotomy - when the patient had a choice of having a
pallidotomy or a thalodotomy, and that was it, 'cause they were
the only FDA approved surgical procedures available, we now have
DBS-type surgeries as an alternative.

Eventually palladotomy may no longer be performed, and hopefully
that'll be because there's a  cure or a "corrective treatnent"
treatment to for PD.

Barb Mallut
barb_msn@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
-----Original Message-----
From: Chris van der Linden <cvdlinde@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: PARKINSN@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <PARKINSN@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Thursday, September 30, 1999 1:18 AM
Subject: Re: surgery


>> Ron,
>>
>> I can highly recommend neurosurgery for Parkinson's
>
>But NOT pallidotomy!!!!
>
>Chris