Posted by: David Barton ®
02/24/2014, 22:56:14
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I don't think many people will say Botox gives you a perfect voice (either with bilateral or unilateral injections). But the absence of extreme breathiness makes unilateral preferable - for me anyway. Botox is not going to give any of us back our pre-SD voices ... but it does deal to a large extent with the weird-sounding spasms, and it does reduce the effort involved with untreated SD.Make sure you know the number of units injected each time - that is critical in tweaking the dose up or down to arrive at what is best for you. If your 'good' voice didn't last very long, I would speculate that a higher dose might give you a reasonable sounding voice for longer.
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Posted by: xibalba ®
02/25/2014, 16:06:54
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Mine lasted a little less than three months, so I'm probably going to up the dosage a little. For me, it still beats the dreaded breathy phase of bilateral which lasted almost the same amount of time anyway.
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Posted by: voyagerbh ®
02/25/2014, 20:22:40
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Thx for your replies- I hope more ppl will share bc I have only this one recent experience to compare against. To add, I have consistently received 1.25 units, previously to both sides; I received the same amount to the left side, which brings me to wonder about the Botox that I get. The ENT assured me that I should not receive more, as reported by others. I guess I ought to ask if this means that the Botox dispensed at this clinic is not diluted? Are they all diluted but in different variations? For me, at my worst, before diagnosis, ppl would ask if my voice pained me so there was definitely difficulty on my part to vocalize. Despite the longer than desirable recovery time following bilateral injections, I would eventually have a normal sounding voice again, and that would usually last around 5 mos or so. This time, a full mo has not yet passed since the unilateral and my voice sounds slightly ragged and there are times that I have to exert more than I normally have to in order to vocalize. So my satisfaction has been short-lived- a full wk until the quality started to go downhill.
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Posted by: johnbren ®
02/26/2014, 13:42:57
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I am a veteran of one unilateral shot, but my theory is that if you experience little to no hoarseness/largytis post the shot, the benefit for the average person is going to be low. Therefore I am not surprised that several are saying that the unilateral didn't last long.My suggestion would be to keep upping the dosage until you reach the point of some mild downtime post shot and see how long that lasts. Like you I had too long of a downtime even with a low dosage with bilateral shots. Got my unilateral shot on Friday. Having some mild laryngitus now, but can be heard so happy about that. Next test will be how long this lasts and how long the shot lasts.
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Posted by: voyagerbh ®
02/26/2014, 22:36:24
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John, when you say veteran of unilaterals, how long have you been getting these? And unless I misread what you have written, did you say that some hoarseness afterwards means better voice for you later? So far, from all that I have read on this BB, I have gotten the impression that unilaterals typically avoid the breathiness that one can expect from bilaterals which make them preferable. I don't know what to think about unilaterals at this point- I am disappointed after the brief week of having what is normal sounding voice. I have no other experience to go by right now. Guess I can email the dr at this point to inquire further as far as success rates or what might be going on in my case.
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Posted by: johnbren ®
02/27/2014, 14:39:27
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I mentioned that I have only had one so don't have the experience of others. I too switch to unilateral after reading about the less breathy period that people were having after the unilateral shots vs bi-lateral. However also seeing a lot of people saying that the benefits are not last as long either with the unilateral shots.I was getting a total of 2.5 units (1.25 each side) with my bilateral shots. If I went down to 1.25 units in total, my breathiness would be less and it would not last as long. So could make a similar statement that bilateral was less breathy for me. While I am seeing some better initial outcome from a unilateral vs bi-lateral shot not sure that there is as big of a difference between the shots for everyone. In the end a lower than needed dosage will result in less breathiness and shorter duration regardless of the shot method. Would love to read some studies on this if there are any.
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Posted by: johnbren ®
02/27/2014, 14:43:24
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Did you mention what your unilateral dosage was vs your bilateral dosage? I went with my total bilateral amount of 2.5 units into one side. Would expect that to last 4 months.I would say that I have about 50% of my normal breathiness. And I usually have about 6 weeks before I reach about 85% of my normal voice. Hoping that means 3 weeks or less of breathiness now and still get the 4 months in between shots.
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Posted by: sopranick7 ®
02/28/2014, 19:44:25
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I too prefer having a little "downtime" because to me it means my Dr. has hit the mark and that I will have a little longer to go b/twen shots...thus preferring the bi lateral. However, my last shot was bi lateral and I wanted 1 unit less on one vocal chord and I really like it...though I don't have any down time thus far..so I do wonder how long it will last. My previous Dr. and I seemed to be stuck at a high level of dosage and we really weren't communicating that much about dosage levels...he stopped asking and I stopped communicating concerns about exact levels of botox I was getting...but there were times it was just WAYYYY to high for over 2 months at a time...and I think that depressed me more than talking w/ SD tremors....so yes, keep close track of exactly how much you are getting. Good luck.
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Posted by: Dwight ®
03/11/2014, 11:38:06
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I said this before but the thread disappeared. A purely unilateral injection doesn't seem to work for me. It causes diplophonia, or gravelly voice, in which the cords vibrate out of synch with each other. What works best for me is staggering the dosage; so I get 1 unit in one cord and 2 units in the other.
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Posted by: Will Blum ®
03/11/2014, 22:30:34
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Old threads age off the first page of bulletin board. The thread you said that disappeared is on page two. It is third thread on page. Here is link to thread.http://www.dysphonia-bb.org/forums/sd/posts/41531.html
Related link: Link to Past Thread on Page Two
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Posted by: Dwight ®
03/12/2014, 12:58:49
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Thanks, I wasn't sure how the page thing worked. But it is probably good to reiterate my experience in new threads anyway. The experience I had was very bad, and I'd like to warn others, even if most people do not get the gravelly voice. My doctor, Robert Bastian, was not surprised; he prefers bi-lateral or else staggering the dose.
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