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, December 21, 2010

Undisclosed side-effects of ETS procedure

After a mean of 123 mo 36 patients could be re-evaluated. Eighteen patients (50%) were free from former symptoms, while sequels were still present in 18 patients (50%).

Numbness and paresthesia are rarely reported in the literature but are present in up to 10% of patients 1 year after a thoracoscopic procedure [2,9]. It is known that numbness and dysesthesia may decrease by time, but long-term results are not known.

Early postoperative sequels are frequently found in VATS procedures, but patients with pain even after years have a nearly 50% chance to eliminate their problems. In addition, numbness and dysesthesia seem to disappear almost completely several years after the procedure.

http://www.ejcts.ch/cgi/content/full/32/3/409