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

Friday, September 2, 2011

painful vasospastic condition in the right arm following surgical sympathectomy on the left side

Spinal dorsal column stimulation has been used in the treatment of a patient with a painful vasospastic condition in the right arm following surgical sympathectomy on the left side. After sympathectomy the left arm became constantly dry and warm and consistently lacked skin vasomotor (laser Doppler flowmetry) responses to arousing stimuli, indicating a complete loss of sympathetic vasomotor innervation.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/n823388l26q330m3/