ENT Office Visit

Ted,

Let me tell you about my experience with surgery. First off, if you have large turbinates (you said small, but I think you meant large) that surgery I can whole-heartedly recommend--you will be so happy you did it. But do NOT do it at the same time as anything done in the throat--both surgery cause enough discomfort. You don't want to do them all at once. Bad, bad idea.

Second, I had a tonsilectomy in July. Six weeks later I saw my pressure needs fall 3 cm of water from pre-surgery levels. If you are already at 10, just a tonsilectomy alone could potentially get you off of cpap.

Also, you should know that having a tonsilectomy can greatly firm up a flabby palate. The removal of the tonsils causes the tonsil beds to contract and firm up. You really may not need that tissue removed--it may naturally firm up with the tonsil removal. Mine did.

The tonsil surgery is no picnic. It took 2 weeks for me to get back to feeling normal. But I have problems with pain meds--they make me throw up, so I was on a very mild pain reliever and in a lot of discomfort because of that. But the surgery was so worth it. Like I said, my pressure needs went down significantly, which increased my comfort with cpap. I found my breathing during the day improved even. My tonsils were large enough that they touched during allergy season, so you can imagine how uncomfortable that could be!

I'm with Snoredog--I would NEVER allow anyone to touch my uvula or trim my palate, for the very reasons he states. The surgery is known to not be very effective overall.

My ENT is awesome, and he really wanted to do UPPP on me, but after all the reading I have done here and getting different opinions from a neurologist and an oral surgeon I came to the conclusion that tonsilectomy was going to be a good idea, but the rest wasn't. The oral surgeon says that my biggest problem now is my large tongue/small mouth combo. If I can someday get the Aspire surgery (a tongue tether--this surgery is still in trials) I suspect I may be off cpap.

I would get another opinion, maybe from a sleep specialist in another field. UPPP is not reversible. But a tonsilectomy alone is a relatively routine surgery with little risk, as is turbinate reduction. The reason I may do the Aspire surgery is that it is completely reversible and in my case I happen to feel pretty sure that my remaining problem is my tongue.

I hope that helps. I'm proud of your weight loss!

jen

I just realized this was a very old posting. So, Ted, what was your conclusion? How did it all turn out?

jen