Hello to all friends here.
I hope you are all just fine.
I’m going to undergo gamma knife stereotactic radiosurgery tomorrow. What short- and long - term consequences am I supposed to expect ? And what about during gamma knife?
Thanks so much in advance.
Matina Gourgioti from Greece.
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It’s very late! I hope it goes very nicely tomorrow!
Tomorrow, the frame is fixed rather tightly to your head to enable focusing the treatment. It is undoubtedly uncomfortable. I am sure they will give you a local anaesthetic to make it bearable.
The points at which the frame fixes will be sore for some days.
Then, that’s it!
I think you’re having a tumor attacked, so the effects of attacking that will be different from most of the people here. For AVM patients, the radiation is focussed on the vasculature and this gives rise to changes in blood flow. For you, I don’t know how focusing on a tumor affects things. I guess that some of the side effects of possible collateral necrosis and of oedema may be common to both. These seem to me to start to show themselves for AVM patients at about the 5 month or 6 month mark. For AVM patients, steroids are often used to manage the oedema but whether steroids would be used where there is a tumor, I don’t know.
However, our friend Merl in the @ModSupport team is a tumor patient and may be able to share some experience, though I think he has had a number of craniotomy operations rather than gamma knife.
We do have a separate forum for traumatic brain injury patients but it has been very quiet for a long time.
You’ll be great tomorrow and nothing happens very quickly if you follow a similar path to AVM patients.
My very best wishes to you and your family! Well done for getting on with it! Do let us know how you get on and stay in contact!
Lots of love,
Richard
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Thank you so much my dear friend.
Lots of love!!
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Hey Matina,
I’m Merl from the Modsuppoort Team and as Richard states I too have a tumour. Mine’s a low grade astrocytoma. The neurosurgeons have operated on the growth itself, via craniotomy and I also have a shunt to drain the fluid from my skull. The growth itself is compressing the aqueduct, the drain tube, blocking the flow of fluid causing hydrocephalus.
What to expect? That’s a question for which there is no exact answer to. I’ve required a few neurosurgeries and none of my surgeries have been the same, so people can bounce back really well, with very little in the way of side effects. Whilst for others there can be long term issues. One of the big issues can be the actual positioning of the growth and the surrounding structures. In the past it was thought that certain areas of the brain controlled certain functions. It is now better understood that this is not the case and different regions of the brain work in conjunction with each other. Due to this sometimes what can be deemed as having minimal impact on one individual can have a huge impact on another.
I’m not sure if you’ll get to see this before tomorrow your time, but here’s my advice:-
*Be kind to yourself.
*Listen to your own body
*Don’t push your limits
*Take the time your body needs and not just the time your mind thinks it needs.
As I say to many members, some people bounce back really well, some can have lingering issues and for some it can be life changing. From everybody else’s reports with gamma knife, the results take time, so patience will be needed.
Wishing you the very best and please, do let us know how it all goes.
Merl from the Modsupport Team
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