Left Not Quite As Good As The Right, But Close

I received a call today from the research manager of the Magnetic Resonance-guided Focused Ultrasound Surgery (MRgFUS) for depression clinical trial of which I am a part.  It has now been three days since I had the surgery and she just wanted to check in with me to see if I am experiencing any negative side-effects.

I am lucky.  I have not experienced any bad side-effects thus far.  It is not uncommon for people that undergo MRgFUS to experience headaches for many days or weeks following the surgery.  This is not from the lesions that they create in the brain, but from the intense pressure that the skull is placed under by the frame apparatus while the operation is taking place.  I experienced a headache immediately following the surgery, but have not had a headache since.  I am very thankful for this.

The only side effect that I have had is that my eyes are quite swollen and watery.  This is also a common side effect and comes from the holes that are opened through the skin when the frame is attached to the skull.  The holes are right above the eyes and can irritate a muscle that goes by there and around the eyes.  This causes the eyes to get swollen.  This is a very minor side-effect and quite manageable.

The interesting thing that she said, however, is that they received the results from the MRI that was performed the day following the surgery.  In my previous blog post, I described how in the surgery they were able to create a good lesion on the right side of my brain, but had difficulty creating a lesion on the left side.  They had to repeatedly do sonications at maximum intensity to try and create a lesion, and, even then, they weren't sure if they were successful.  Well, she said that the results from the MRI came back and there is a lesion on the left side of my brain as well.  It isn't as big as the lesion on the right side, but it is definitely there.  This is encouraging news.  Following the surgery, the neurosurgeon said that they did not know yet if lesions on both sides of the brain were required or whether the size of them would influence the effectiveness of the surgery.  However, it is certainly good that they were able to at least create a lesion on both sides.  One would think that it would increase the odds of the surgery being successful if they were able to complete the goals for the surgery on both sides of the brain.

After three days, I haven't noticed any change in my mood thus far.  This is to be expected.  They said that it could take anywhere from three months to a year for me to notice anything.  I hope that if I experience anything it happens soon, but don't expect it.  Patience is the name of the game right now.