Brachial plexus injury not carpal tunnel

[WilliamJE]

At least that's what I'm thinking five weeks after I had surgery to correct the later.

First let me remind readers of my history. My surgery, valve replacement and repair of a ascending aortic aneuyrsm took place on 8-13-08. It didn't take me long after waking up to notice I had a tingling and weakness in my right hand and fingers after surgery. For a time I couldn't make a fist with my right hand.

In late 2008, my primary doc suggested it might be carpal tunnel. So I went to a neurologist who confirmed CT. Then I went to a hand doctor who examined me and said the same thing and gave me a shot to try to relieve the symptoms. It didn't work at all, so the hand dr. recommended surgery.

I didn't have surgery right away because

1- I was less than 6 months out from OHS and didn't look forward to more surgery.
2- I'm right handed and the loss of use of my right hand after CT surgery would make living difficult.
3- My wife didn't want me to have the surgery.

A year of having a weak right hand finally drove me to have the surgery. I went back to the hand doctor and got operated on Dec 13 2009

Five weeks later my hand feels the same as it did when it went in. The hand doctor said on 1-7 that the symptoms I have may take a year to go away.

Right now I bet they are still there. I bet the doctors misdiagnosed me.

Not long after OHS, I blogged my surgical story at website I wrote at. A commenter with a medical background, said my symptoms sounded like a brachial plexus injury.

My hand doctor stuck with the CT diagnosis. When I asked if a CT injury could happen from OHS, he said yes. This fall when I saw him again, I brought up the BP possibility. He was dismissive of it.

Dr. Jeffrey Rosenfields of Lake Worth apparently has never seen the multiple medical articles I am just finding now by googling the words 'Brachial plexus injury open heart surgery'

I should have done that earlier and right now I'm kicking myself not for doing that easy bit of research. My failure to research a far more likely cause for the injury I had is neglect. Dr. Rosenfields failure to do the same, sounds like medical malpractice. That's if I don't recover the use in my hand.

 

[Lynlw]

I'm sorry to hear this. Didn't anyone do an EMG? I had something tall fall on my back neck, twisted arm. and had a few problems and sounded alot like what you describe, PLUS if I was holding something with that hand i would just drop it, not because it was heavy, my hand just kind of opened on its own. At first couldn't decide what was causing what. It ended up being something wrong with my neck and arm/hand. PT worked fine for my neck, but the way the figured out what was damaged in my hand arm was thru an EMG (which really hurt) I ended up having CT surgery and at the same time surgery for a thumb ligamnet.(dequan something like that)
I wonder IF maybe you DID have CT, (especially since don't you type alot?) BUT also had the brachial or other nerve damage they missed?

 

[mac]

Hi,
Very interesting post. I had AVR, single by-pass on 11/19/09. Ever since I have numbness in my pinky finger and ridge of right hand leading up to the wrist. I also have lost strength and even have a hard time pulling a key from a door lock or turning on the egnition on my truck. It doesn't seem to be getting better. Last night I had ice on it which seemed to make the pain worse, Tylonal doesn't touch it. Getting back to Williams post the syptoms are very much like carpal tunnal. That dull pain and numbness. I had noticed this the first day after surgery and the nurse said this was just from positioning and it will go away in time. The reason that I have to agree that williams Doc screwed up the diagnosis is that I had carpal tunnel surgery for my right had 2 years ago, so I know it didn't all of a sudden come back again post surgery. There is a specific test they do on your right arm to isolate the nerves to verify that you do infact have carpal tunnal, and I am wondering if they did this to you. I am sorry that they took the easy way out and did this surgery when they didn't have to. I am going to research brachial plexus, and see if this is what is going on with my hand. I do have pretty good strength it's just the pinky and ridge and thumb is also weak. Most people on this site say it just takes time. Maybe in my case at only 9 weeks, but you should be fine by now. Hope some of the experts here can give you some more input.

Later,
Mac
AVR single bypass 11/19/09
carbomedics mechanical
Dr. Suri
Mayo Clinic