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

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

73% of patients suffered form 'gustatory sweating' and variety of phenomena

In a series of 100 bilateral upper dorsal sympathectomies performed for palmar hyperhidrosis,
gustatory sweating and other gustatory phenomena were reported by 68 of 93 patients (73%),
followed up for an average of 11/2 years. These gustatory phenomena were quite different from
physiologic gustatory sweating: a wide range of gustatory stimuli caused a variety of phenomena in
varied locations. There was a negative correlation between the incidence of these phenomena and the
occurrence of Horner's syndrome after sympathectomy. Analysis of our observations, and of clinical
and experimental work of others, leads to the conclusion that gustatory phenomena after upper
dorsal sympathectomy are the result of preganglionic sympathetic regeneration or collateral sprouting
with aberrant synapses in the superior cervical ganglion.
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Arch Neurol. 1977;34(10):619-623.