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Old 02-07-2009, 06:18 AM
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Teddy Bear Teddy Bear is offline
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Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: Northeast coast, USA
Posts: 5,055
Thank you all for your thoughts, well wishes, concern, and love! They are all appreciated and I will take all of them with me into surgery! And TY for the laughs and giggles!! Needed them!!!

OF – “Pin the penis on the Pixie”… LOL… I’m going to check.
Scarecrow – Didn’t know there was a Pixie Lady calendar. Hmmm…TY, where’s the
Pixie Men Calendar?
gekkogecko – hahaha - is a scary thought eh.
Lil – That’s my MRI alright!! Thought that was in a locked file.
DM – Never give up the fight!!

scotz – Yes, it’s been around awhile. And the thought of being awake is creepy but you’re right that the docs need to see not only if the tremors stop but also that they haven’t created new ones. Pleasant thought….not!!! But besides interacting with the patient the doc also uses an MRI and CAT-scans taken earlier which allows him to screw a “frame’ of sorts to the patients skull which he uses as a guide. And he also uses sound made by the probe. Each level of the brain ‘sounds’ different and tells the surgeon where he is. From what I understand Parkinson’s has it’s own distinct sound, so he knows when he’s reached his target.


So, I’ve been asked by several to bring you all up to date. Sorry I didn’t sooner, just wasn’t in the right mood I guess.

I’ve had extensive psychological testing. They won’t do the surgery if you have dementia or any form of mental illness. I guess this procedure can make it worse or cause these folks to freak out. The last test was 3 hours long on Christmas Eve. I ignored the little voices all day and boy did they get mad! lol. I passed all of the test in the high end of average, 2 were above average and one low average. All are acceptable for the surgery. Yeah!!!!

We met with the neurosurgeon again. Went over everything… again. As he said, ‘this is not a procedure you rush into.’ He made sure we knew exactly what was going to happen, what the risks where, and that we still wanted to go through with it.

Next step is an MRI on Feb. 17. This is also when they’ll put 4 screws in my head, to be used to hold a frame in place which will guide the doc on the day of surgery. (it can really be said after that I might have a loose screw) Then a Cat-Scan and blood work on the 18th. The surgery will be Feb. 25. They will drill a hole in my skull and insert the wire. A day or 2 after they will implant a device similar to a pace-maker and attach the wire to it. Then many doc visits to regulate the pace-maker thingy and any meds needed.

I’m just taking it easy for now. The procedure I’m having is called deep brain surgery (DBS) for Parkinson’s or deep brain stimulation (DBS) for Parkinson’s. A search using either should get results if you’re interested.

((((Pixies))))…. If you read all that ^ ^ ^ ^ all I can say is wow!! Thank you!

Watch for a new-and-improved teddy to be making an appearance soon.
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