Now this is where it gets kinda strange. I had spent the better part of 8 or 9 years walking down this pain-filled stroke road. It had been kind of a BEAR. So I felt that whatever this procedure held for me, at this point I was ready for it, so, on we go!
I remember going to the hospital, but I couldn’t tell you what time of year it was or anything else, for that matter; I was kinda stoked/scared at the same time. I got to UCSF at 0-Dark-thirty that day. They only do surgery 1 day a week so they have quite a few scheduled. I went in and this nurse gave me a pill and told me to take it, so I did. She then gave me this “open-in-the-back gown” and some huge sock-like slippers and told me to get undressed and put on the gown and socks.. I put on the gown and went to pre-op. They made me sit down and proceeded to shave my head, then they had me lay down on a gurney and wheeled me into the OR. They did the usual things to get me ready, heart monitor, oxygen, all the usual things.
I had been in there for around 20 minutes, when Dr. Barbaro came in and greeted me. He asked me “are you ready, Mr. Brown”, I nodded and he smiled, went over to the MRI put it up to the light… and just stared at it for about 10 minutes. He then called another neurologist in and they BOTH looked at the MRI for a while, talking to each other. Finally, Dr. Barbaro took the MRI down from the light walked over to me and told me he’s have to talk to someone. So, around 30 minutes later he reappeared and told me he was sending me down to have another MRI as that particular MRI was not clear enough to see what he needed to see. I was wheeled out of the OR and sent to Imaging and got another MRI. After that I was told to get dressed and Dr. Barbaro asked somebody to schedule me to see him in his office the next day. I went back to the hotel and crashed.
I had an appointment with the Dr. the next morning. I went in to his office and saw him again. He told me he was sorry for all of the confusion yesterday. He pulled out the new MRI and said he didn’t know who had read the old one but he pointed to this spot on the new one and told me that this was what is known in medical terms as an A.V.M. an arteriovenous malformation. He explained it to me this way, “(AVM) is an abnormal tangle of blood vessels connecting arteries and veins, which disrupts normal blood flow and oxygen circulation”. Mine happened to be deep in my brain and it ruptured. So, the Dr. said he was sending me to another department order to have what’s known as a “Gamma Knife” procedure.
Catch you next post…