Still Waiting For Decisions

24. January 2009 by admin.

We had long discussions with two of the three main doctors today. Dr. Franz wants to do an anatomic hemipherectomy, which means they would go in and remove the left hemisphere completely. Dr. Lee wants to do a functional hemispherectomy. You might be asking yourself the same question we asked. Didn’t she already have a functional hemispherectomy? Apparently she had a functional hemispherotomy. They explained the difference. I would type out the difference but I don’t have enough time.

Before any surgery is done the neurosurgeon (Dr. Mangano) wants to make absolutely sure that her right hemisphere is not responsible for any seizure activity. There are a couple ways they suggest finding out. One way would be to take her off all of her seizure meds and wait for the seizures to start up again and then scan her. The other is to go into the OR and make a small hole in her skull and put strips on her right hemisphere and record activity for about twenty minutes. If there is no seizure activity then they would go ahead and do a functional or anatomic (which ever is decided) hemispherectomy. Dr. Lee does not want to do the anatomic one because it can cause serious complications down the road. Dr. Franz wants to do the anatomic one because then you are absolutely sure there is no connections left. Our friend Jesse Hall had an anatomic hemispherectomy.

Bottom Line is that all three of the doctors are supposed to meet on Monday or Tuesday and then they should come to us with a plan which we can accept or reject. The real bottom line is that Sarah may not have surgery until late next week or the week after.

I will let you know more when I know more. Please keep praying that the correct path is made clear to us.

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