Surgery Laser procedure?

[Japangioma]

You may have seen my thread on the hemangioma forum about my tongue.

details in here....

www.mcentyre.com/tongue.html

I'd like to hear from people who have had surgery and explain how there vascular malformation was removed...

I've been to 2 hospitals now and may make a trip out to New York to see Dr. Waner....

The 2 hosptials both have come out with almost identical plans.

Incision, remove, stitch.

The 1st hospital says I'll lose the current shape of my tongue. The doctor at this hospital seems to want to remove as much surrounding tissue as possible to stop it growing back.

The 2nd hospital says they will use a laser if I request, but only to remove the tumor as if they were using a knife. Not to shrink it or burn it away. THis guy doesn't seem to interested in removing extra tissue. He doesn't seem to think it will grow back either.

Both hospitals thought it was a hemangioma....

I'm educating them any way....

I just sent the 2nd doctor an email voicing my concerns....

I still need more ammunition....

There is a thread in this Discussion Forum, under Hemangioma Help, titled "Have you seen this on a tongue?" dated April 29, 2003: there you will "meet" people with experiences of laser treatmens of a venous malformation of the tongue. If you browse all the topics in this Forum, you should find others: I remember having seen one about a surgery of a tongue by Dr. Waner.

Also, you could check a Web site www.cincinattichildrens.org. Type Venous malformations in their search window.

Lise in Montreal (AVM of the lip)

Hi,

I have a multi-focal malformation on my tongue, cheek, and sinus. I first saw Dr. Waner last July while he was still in Little Rock and he agreed to do lazer surgery on me to shrink the lesion. He said not to worry about the sinus although one side is blocked, I still have good airway through the other side. The tongue was quite large and the purple mass seemed to be getting hard at certain times and very uncomfortable, and was becoming larger as I aged (I'm now 49.) I had the first treatment in October. It was the worst as far as pain and being uncomfortable. But it had to be better than having part of my tongue removed, which I was facing. My tongue was very swollen after the surgery, and I was on liquids for the first few days and my tongue had a slimy white film on it which came off in a few days It took about three weeks before it was healed enough that I could work again. And there was great improvement in the size and look of my tongue. The purple vein-like lesion was gone, but there was still a lot of bulk that needed to be taken care of. I had my second lazer treatment in December. My tongue healed much faster after this treatment. He also used a lazer on my cheek to help with the veins that looked the darkest and most noticable. I was back to work within a few days. I had my last treatment on February 5th.
This treatment was intersticial. (Meaning they inserted the lazer into my tongue and zapped it from the inside to further help reduce bulk) Recovery was a couple of weeks. Each of these treatments were done out-patient, I did not have to spend even one night in the hospital. I am so thankful to Linda Shannon for this site that helped put me in touch with Dr. Waner. When he first saw me he said that the tongue was the most common VM and that it was easy to fix without any actual cutting. He reassured me that I would not loose any good tissue and that I would be so happy with the results, which I am!! I am very lucky that I did not go ahead with the suggestions of my Dr. in Florida who wanted to remove almost half of my tongue.

If you have any questions please let me know

Gayle