I'll ask my radiation oncologist for a web link to the study that he told me about. He said that at the House Clinic in LA surgery after radiation resulted in 50% cases of facial paralysis and that patients looked as if they had a stroke..
In here http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15630374 I found that:
This information is absolutely WRONG. We have had quite a few patients on this forum over the years who had surgery at the House Clinic after failed radiation with very good results. House indeed published a study some years ago regarding surgery after radiation, and even though (naturally) they have a bias toward surgery, careful reading of the study reveals that really the differences in outcome between radiated and non-radiated tumors were not statistically significant. As for the study that you mention, it is outdated, and based on a very limited number of patients, and by a group that is not the best in terms of overall outcomes.
After my failed radiation I consulted with 5 experienced surgeons. One said that I had 100% chance of facial paralysis. I found afterwards that most of his patients do have paralysis anyway
![Roll Eyes ::)](https://www.anausa.org/smf/Smileys/classic/rolleyes.gif)
So good that I stayed away from him. The rest told me that really there is no difference, and no way you can tell if a tumor will be difficult to remove/sticky etc. before getting there, no matter whether it is radiated or not. The surgeon I chose eventually told me that radiated tumors are not more difficult in the hands of an experienced surgeon and he was right. I didn't have any facial problems after my surgery.
Regarding your other question about having help, I would strongly recommend to arrange for help, at least for a week or two after being discharged. This surgery is not a walk in the park and you cannot predict in what condition you will be (i.e. dizziness etc.). It is better to be prepared. I had family fly all the way from Europe to Canada to help me out.
Another thing that I wanted to mention is that the control rates mentioned by your radiation oncologist indeed don't look that great. Is this center specialized in these tumors? Sometimes Linac machines are more specialized in various types of cancer. You may want to seek the advice from a more experienced center.
Obviously the choice between the two is yours, and as everyone else mentioned, research is very important. There are many considerations, such as access to specialists, overall situation, age, personal preference etc. My advice is, whatever you do to seek the most experienced specialists that you can get access to.
Marianna