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

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Painful sweating after nerve sprouting

The authors propose that after destruction of cutaneous nerves, aberrant regenerant sprouting innervates sweat glands, producing gustatory sweating as in auriculotemporal syndrome (Frey syndrome), and innervates nociceptors, producing pain.

http://www.neurology.org/cgi/content/abstract/63/8/1471