My Mother has AN.....Up date

[Mary]

Hello everyone,                                                                                                                         November 12,  2005

Well the tumor is GONE.   It ended up to be a 4.2 cm acoustic neuroma.   I finally brought mom to the House Clinic in LA.         Dr. Friedman and Dr. Hitselberger are the ones who removed mom's tumor via translab operation.   Her facial nerve was going thru the tumor.  Dr. Friedman reconected the nerve by grafting a nerve from her neck to the facial nerve.    So for now....mom has no facial nerve.   To protect the cornia, Dr.Levine inserted a spring into the eye lid and did a tuck to the bottom lid.   This was done yesterday under a local aneteisia. (sp?)   Her 5th nerve was affected by the tumor so mom will have to wear a contact lens untill she gets feeling back to her eye ball.   

We leave here on Monday.   Mom will go right to an inpatient re-hab.   That's the only reason they are allowing us to leave.   I call mom "my energizer bunny".   Because the tumor was so large it affected many nerves already.   Mom did not have nausa, dizziness or headaches after surgery.   Her main probelm was her eye and not being able to see very well so her balance was not the greatest.   She did have more stablity though the day after surgery and every day she gets sharper mentally.

I know I didn't go into very many details.   If you have any special questions I wiil answer them either here or via email.

Thank you to all that helped me here.   It's been a somewhat long road and I know the road to recovery will be longer.

Mary

[Mary]

I noticed the time I posted.   It may say 9:33 am but actually here in LA it's 6:33 am .

[wind6]

Mary, Thank you so much for the update and happy to hear your mom is doing well. She is lucky to have such a loving daughter. My best to you and yours.

[GM]

Mary,

I'm so happy that your Mom is doing well!  Here's to a speedy recovery.

Gary

[Mary]

Hi everyone,

The last time I wrote it was two days before we came home from LA and the House.   I was reading the reports from the doctors on the plane.   Mom's tumor was 4.5 x 5 cm.   So in all respect it grew 1 to 1.5 cm ( that's right  CM ) in 11 months.   So in my mothers case as she got older and the tumor got bigger....it grew faster.   Why?   There could be a number of reasons.   My opinion....the MRI's.   It's strickly my opinion.   Before we found out about the tumor she was doing fine and was dealing with the symtons.   Her first CT scan was March of 03.   In May of 04 she started to somewhat fall.   She fell in June and then in September which is when all of this really started.    The first MRI was in December of 04 and the tumor was 3 x 3.3 x 3.5.   The second tumor was in September of 05 and the tumor was 3.5 x 3.8 x 4.   In the report after surgery, they listed the tumor to be 4.5 x 5.   I can't believe that the radialogists were that OFF in their reading and measuring of the tumor.

Anyway mom comes home from rehab on Thanksgiving.   Yeaaaaaah.   Her rt. eye is still shut because of the swelling from the spring implant.   Her balance is wonderful.   She can stand without swaying  and her stength is coming alone.   I truely believe she will get rid of the walker.   At least to a cane.   Her short term memory is ok but it seemed to be better right after surgery.    Either way I can't wait to start working with her.   I think together we can get her back to at least 80%.   That's my goal.

Everyone have a great Thanksgiving with your families and cherish evey moment together.

Mary

[wind6]

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving with your mom and family Mary. Most of us here have lots to be thankful for. Oh, and thanks for the update.

[dgrummer]

Mary – I know you are from Arkansas – as is my husband and I – we must have used the same radiologist b/c they made an error on my husband’s MRI report and said it was 7.5 cm!  Took me a week to get someone else to finally look at the MRI and tell me how big it really was.  I’ve since had 4 other doctors confirm the size - 2.8.  They were to correct the report – but never did.  Never even heard from them again.  Obviously – we won’t be using that Imaging Center again.