Billy Sticker has Chiari I malformation, where brain tissue herniates through the skull and presses on the spinal cord, causing numbness, tingling, and severe headaches. He's having decompression surgery with Dr. Don Kim, which involves enlarging the opening at the base of the skull and patching the membrane around the spinal cord to reduce fluid leaks to about 5%.
Hey, guys, Billy Sticker here. And I posted a video the other day. I think I was on my way to the doctor or something and made a comment that I was just recently diagnosed with a Chiari1 malformation and seen three different neurosurgeons and a neurologist and they all recommended that I have the decompression procedure. And so what I wanted to do is just do a quick little video going over just the basics of information that I found about a Chiari malformation. If you're watching this, you're probably just trying to do research. Either you've been diagnosed with one or maybe a family member or something. But Chiari I malformation, there's different types of Chiari malformations. There's a type 1, 2, 3 and 4. That's not the severity of a malformation. Those are each different types. So the Chiari I malformation is what we're going to be talking about. But here you have your skull, your brain. This is your cerebellum back here in a Chiari one, the hole at the base of the skull, it's called the foramen magnum. This should be just where your spinal cord comes out. Well, in a Chiari one, the tonsils on your cerebellum are actually wedged down and they're coming out of that hole. Also putting pressure on your spinal cord. Well, this does a few things. One, all that pressure on your spinal cord just isn't healthy, but you can start having issues. Some of my symptoms were pretty severe. Numbness and tingling in my hands and my arms, really bad headaches. Doing one of the exams, they noticed some reflexes in my left leg were delayed. But headaches is one of the big ones. A headache from a Chiari one typically is going to start at the back of the head and it may radiate out, but a lot of times they're going to start. You're going to have bad headaches back here compared to, you know, a cluster headache or a migraine where it may just be on one side or the other, or sinus headache where it's in the front. But what they do is, is it's called a. I said it just a minute ago, basically a Chiari decompression. They do a craniectomy where this hole, I'm drawing this a little bit bigger. But the hole right here, right here, they'll actually go in and they open up that hole to take the pressure off the brain right there. Well, when they open this up, you still have what's known as the dura, which separates you have your skull, the dura, and then your brain. They'll make an incision in the dura because even though the skull, they've removed some of the skull to take the pressure off, the dura is still applying pressure to that. So they'll open this up. I'm actually using Dr. Don Kim out of Houston, and he's one of the top surgeons in the country for this. He actually handled Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords case whenever she went to Houston. So like I said, I went to several of them to see what I needed to do, and they all said the same thing. But I figured if I'm going to have the procedure done, I want to go to the vest. But he told me whenever he makes this incision in the dura, he almost always sees the brain sigh. It's like it's finally saying, ugh, that pressure is gone. So once this dura is opened up, they have to go and put a patch on it. Some places use, like the membrane of a bovine or a cow's heart to patch it. Dr. Kim said he started using this synthetic material that they'll use to patch it. And really one of the only risks. Well, there's a few different risks that's associated with any surgery, but this one in particular, one of the main issues they see is some, sometimes this patch will leak spinal fluid. He said that only happens in about 5% of the cases. But since they started using this special synthetic, I don't even know what it's called. But he said that's virtually eliminated that complication. But once they patch that, then they just sew you back up. And the incision they make is a vertical incision. It'll be just right here in this area. Well, I don't have any hair. And I was hoping that they could make the incision horizontal right here, where maybe the scar wouldn't be as noticeable. But what happens when they make that incision? You have the muscles that are right here under your skin. They make that incision. There's a membrane that they slice that membrane and then they pull the muscles to separate the muscles to expose the skull. And he said that typically for the first few days or a week or so after your main soreness is going to be the manipulation of the muscles in your neck from doing that. But anyway, that's it. They patch it. Can't read one malformation. Today is actually a Saturday. I'm having my procedure done on Monday. So in just a few days, and I'll post another video, let you know how the recovery is going. Thanks.
