Hey Jojo,
What new dietary restrictions were recommended beyond what you are already doing for Meniere's?

I have not had it done......and would be very hesitant to do so. My first ENT talked to me about it and it is a very serious, irreversible surgery with significant risks. It is not done on bilateral patients and how do you know you won't become bilateral down the road, as I have? There is a risk of facial paralysis among other things. It should be a last resort----after everything else has been done and failed to give relief. Even then, I believe I would be happier just taking valium forever and not chancing the surgery. Please, please research the surgery before you make a decision to do it. That being said, it's a personal decision and I wish you good luck with whatever you decide.

God bless,
Marlene

Thanks Jojo,
I eat a lot of avocados, bananas and nuts too. And I just made a huge pot of Nine bean soup. I've never heard of these as possible migraine triggers before. Very interesting. Oh, and the soup was really good....

Leslie

I have had this procedure done, well sort of. I had a Acoustic Neuroma which is a tumor that wraps itself around the 8th cranial nerve, the same nerve that they cut in the procedure you mention. The outcome is therefore the same for patients of both procedures. In my case I faced the possibility of facial paralysis (similar to what a stroke victim would look like) I also had a 50/50 chance of loosing all my hearing and balance in that ear. In the procedure you mention the chances are 100% you will loose both hearing and balance in that ear. The million dollar question then becomes, "do you have any remaining hearing in your diseased ear?" If so are you willing to risk loosing it completely? Another issue is balance, your good ear has to learn to compensate for the lose on the other side. This takes going to vestibular physical rehab. It did help me but I never got good enough to do many of the things I enjoyed before like golf ect. I would say I got back to 80ish percent better, it was good enough to go back to work and to excel in my job. The last consideration is if the MD ever goes to the other ear you probably would be at a point where you will eventually become totally disabled. Again I have a good example of this and again it is myself. After my surgery to remove the Acoustic Neuroma and my recovery I developed MD in my remaining good ear. I have no balance function and walk with a rotary walker. I have vertigo several times a day and drop attacks several times a month, I am totally disabled from any employment.

I am not trying to post for you to do or not do this surgery. In hindsight I wish I had more information on the risk. The doctors do not express really what is at stake. A reasonable explanation would be to say you may not be as bad as you are now but you will not get totally better either. There are some risk and complications.

God bless!

Rich

I appreciate the information!! I definitely am not signing up for the surgery immediately but my Meniere's doctor stated that if I can no longer control my symptoms with diet, exercise, and medication than that might be an option for me. After doing more tests my right ear is permanently damaged which I don't know if worse than last year or not. I had the endolymphatic sac decom surgery in Jan and had pretty good results. This has been a bad month I've been dealing with daily vertigo and needing more meds than I have for quite some time. After being deployed for over 3 months my husband is back so at least the stress about driving is better and he can help out more.
Thanks for the advice!
Leslie