Hi... I had surgery about a year and a half ago. I had general anesthesia and talked with the anesthesiologist about my SD before surgery. He had heard of SD, but knew very little about it...but he did take the time to let me go into some detail about it and to express my concerns. I had heard that there are some people who have had adverse effects from intubation or from endoscopy procedures (the kind you have to check out your esophagus or stomach, etc.) Apparently the tubes can (on RARE occasions) irritate the larynx or the muscles in that area...or irritate the nerves...I'm not exactly sure what it is that causes the problem. ( Actually, I think what I heard regarding this is that there are a few people whose SD FIRST STARTED after an intubation procedure. I'm not sure that I've ever read that someone's SD was made worse by intubation.) Have you checked out the bulletin board archives on this subject? There might have been some previous posts on anesthesia and SD sometime during the past few years.
When I had surgery, I had no adverse effects at all. My SD was the same after surgery as it was before. Maybe some other people on the bulletin board can post some info about their own experiences with surgery. Is there anyone out there who had a negative effect from general anesthesia?
Good luck with everything!
Mary Salisbury
AB/AD SD
Minnesota
