Brain Surgery

Re: Brain Surgery

Submitted by seizure free on Sun, 2008-06-01 - 19:51

Hi,

I fully understand what you are going through, I had brain surgery in '2003. It is my opinion that everyones experiences with surgery differs remarkably - pre-op and post-op. That is why the neurologists tend to not divulge too much informataion.

Ultimately it is your decision to make and yours alone, whatever you decide I wish you the best.

Stuart 

Re: Brain Surgery

Submitted by one4gimp on Mon, 2008-06-02 - 14:10

I had brain surgery in 1981 because I started having seizures and they found a tumor it was luckily not cancer. Things were a lot different then they didn't have MRI, only CT scans and Angiograms. Those were fun just like surgery themselves I think I was to young to be really scared, it didn't hit me until they shaved my head the morning of surgery. but, they probably saved my life because while they were in there they found an anyurism that none of the tests had shown. Luckily the only side effects were the loss of my entire left field of vision, (picture seeing out of half each eye), and still taking AEDS. It took a while but they got the meds to control the seizures, and by the time I was a teenager my life was normal. But, then at about age 27 I started having complex partial seizures. We didn't even know what they were at first since gran mals started everything. Now we are still trying to find the right combo of meds, and the partials sometimes turn into gran mals.I still have the partials, and we are down to one or two gran mals a year. I found this site looking into the surgery option also,and from what I've read the only thing to consider if you are a good canidate, is" what impact would any possible side effects have on your family?" Are you mentally strong enough to live with them?(the side effects) It seems like you need to ask yourself, "Is the impact of my seizures worse on me and my family than the worst imagineable side effect of the surgery?" That's where you will find your ansewer. But, remember no matter what God has a special plan for every one. 

Re: Brain Surgery

Submitted by aussie2006 on Mon, 2008-06-09 - 05:31

Hi,

I had surgery on left temporal lobe /hippocampus on March 1st 2006, I have not had a siezure since , before surgery i was taking 14 tablets a day for epilepsy, I am still coming off the medication because I had been taking them so long but I am currently only taking 6 tablets a day and hope to get it down to about 2 a day.

I  initially only intended to have all the preminary testing done and I had no intentions of letting anyone open up my head and mess around with my brain. After all the testing I met the surgeon and that changed everything for me.  He told me I had a 70% chance of a cure-, no doctor ever had said I could be cured, a 20% chance of improvement,and 10% chance of, no change or worse off. The surgeon explained that the surgery is less complicated than removing an appendix,and told me he could do it for me the following week,this was a big plus because I didnt have a lot of time to  wait , I had knocked back a vacancy twice when I was going for the prelinary testing because I had long periods to wait and think about it.

If you are given the ok for surgery I would strongly reccomend it,any good surgeon would not proceed with surgery if there was a risk to you. It is a life altering operation.

I am still to obtain my drivers licence ,but this cant be done until I have stopped the medication reductions as it is law in Australia that you cannot get a licence whilst coming off anti convulsant medications

It is a big decision and a hard one to make , but what a difference it makes to your life.

I was in a private hospital for 1week  then at home recovering a further 6 weeks before returning to work.