United Brachial Plexus Network, Inc.

I was hoping to hear some good news. Please advise on your recovery after surgery. At what point in time did things begin to improve? How much improvement? Has anyone every gotten more than 80% back?

Hi....your name is Maureen right?

You had responded to a thread that I think Courtney had started and you wanted to know how much recovery my son Eric has had. I meant to answer but didn't so I'm sorry for that.

Eric's accident was 3 years ago, he was age 20. We had surgery with Dr. Tiel in New Orleans about 4 months after. Eric's injury is complete, total avulsions of C5-T1. The surgery was to repair the C5 and C6 with clean up and intercostal nerve grafts. I think it was about 6 months post surgery that Eric started to get some movement....very very slight at first where you couldn't even be sure that it moved. The surgery was only intended to give him bicep & deltoid. I think we have both. Eric still continues to feel improvement even now almost 3 years after surgery. We are due to see Dr. Tiel again this October. Last October Dr. Tiel was very pleased with the success of Eric's surgery and said he thought it was near the top of the success scale. Eric's recovery is by no means complete however. He has no use of lower arm, wrist, hand, fingers, etc. Only shoulder/elbow. And, that's all we expected from the surgery. Maybe someday we'll investigate additional surgeries if they'll bring further return. I don't know if Eric will decide that it's worth it though. He's pretty adjusted to what he has now and as you know the surgery he has already had was pretty considerable.

We are thinking about going to the Lake George gathering. I'm not sure though if we can attend for less than the full weekend if we want to. Eric will be changing from a part time student to a full time student next semester and it may not be possible to attend the full weekend. I know that you had expressed a possible interest in attending if others of that age group were. Anyways we're still thinking about it. Please feel free to email me or reply to this post.

Hi Nancy! I think that you guys should try and get to camp! I am a full time college student as well. I think I have to miss the first class, just for my marketing class. I have emailed the teacher already and got the sylabus. Tell Eric to try that! Hope to see you at camp!
~Courtney xoxo