The amount of compensatory sweating depends on the patient, the damage that the white rami communicans incurs, and the amount of cell body reorganization in the spinal cord after surgery.
Other potential complications include inadequate resection of the ganglia, gustatory sweating, pneumothorax, cardiac dysfunction, post-operative pain, and finally Horner’s syndrome secondary to resection of the stellate ganglion.
www.ubcmj.com/pdf/ubcmj_2_1_2010_24-29.pdf

After severing the cervical sympathetic trunk, the cells of the cervical sympathetic ganglion undergo transneuronic degeneration
After severing the sympathetic trunk, the cells of its origin undergo complete disintegration within a year.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1439-0442.1967.tb00255.x/abstract

Monday, June 9, 2008

Sympathectomy and the immue system

In rodents, chemical sympathectomy attenuates primary
splenic antibody responses to systemic immunisation and lymph-node antibody responses to footpad challenge, suppresses cytotoxic T-cell responses to allogeneic cells, and reduces delayed-type hypersensitivity reactions; it is also associated with an enhancement of in-vivo lymphoproliferation in some lymph nodes and an increase in natural killer (NK) cell activity.'[ 11, 12] Chemical sympathectomy also increases the severity of experimental allergic encephalomyelitis[ 13] and adjuvant-induced arthritis in susceptible strains of rats. [ 14]
Psychoneuroimmunology: Interactions between the nervous system and the immune system.

Source: Lancet, 1/14/95, Vol. 345 Issue 8942, p99, 5p,

Author(s): Ader, Robert; Cohen, Nicholas