Brachial plexus injury

I need help in finding someone who has seen severe muscle spasms in the shoulder. My 16 yr old son has been receiving Botox treatments to paralyse his shoulder, due to an injury to his brachial Plexus during a shoulder surgery to fix his posterior dislocation. I have travelled to NYC and no one has ever seen anything like this. Spasm can last up to 7 hrs, he was in a palliative coma for 14 days, and nothing stops these recurring spasms. Even in his sleep. Botox only lasts 5 weeks at a time. We are on round 2. He can not go on like this. Any information or help would be a blessing. MRN shows T2 hypertensity enlarged trunk and C5 and C6 nerve roots. Thank you.

Hello @cillamac, and welcome to Connect. I see you have made a few connections in other discussions on Connect regarding your son's shoulder injury.

I would like to invite @qayahsmom to this conversation, as she had a daughter who injured her brachial plexus during birth in 2010 and may be able to provide some support and information regarding your son. I would also like to invite @kanyonkick @bessygo and @susanacj as they have all discussed brachial plexus injuries in the past on Connect as well.

This information was also from our community director from a previous discussion:

"I did some scoping about for you. Mayo Clinic performs hundreds of brachial plexus procedures annually. We have specialists at all 3 campuses including Jacksonville. You can find more information about brachial plexus care at Mayo Clinic here: http://mayocl.in/2dC9MZj This page also includes additional links to research and patient success stories including this one: http://mayocl.in/2dgmJpM&;

@cillamac, other members have talked about continuing the search until you find answers. But, how are you coping during this difficult time? Is your son handling this difficult time well also?

Hi Daniel,
Welcome to Connect. You can find more information about brachial plexus care at Mayo Clinic here: http://mayocl.in/2dC9MZj This page also includes additional links to research and patient success stories including this one: http://mayocl.in/2dgmJpM

Also here are a few additional Connect discussions you may be interested in reading where you'll meet other members like @cillamac @susanacj @bessygo and @gjs411 who are dealing with brachial plexus injuries and surgery:

– How do I test for longterm (9 years) suspected nerve avulsion in neck? http://mayocl.in/2c60Aw6
– Brachial Plexus Injury / C-5 palsy – how to deal with pain? http://mayocl.in/2crmAA4
– Severe arm injury resulting in numerous symptoms and no relief http://mayocl.in/2c5Z0dR

Daniel, can you tell us a bit more about your situation? How were you injured? How are you managing pain now and what treatment options are available to you?

Can you give us a little bit more of info. Birth? Accident? Time of injury? Paralysis where? Etc.

Hi this is Brandy, Daniel's wife 🙂 Thank you guys for replying! Danny is 39yrs old and was in an ATV accident April 30th damaging the right brachail plexus, right clavicle fx, right scapula fx along with right broken ribs (flail chest), temporal fx causing hearing loss of right ear, lacerated liver, and hematoma of his pancreas. Everything has progressed very well minus the right arm. I have posted the outcome of our last appointment below. We go for the EMG test today. The Dr thinks that Danny will get movement back from his elbow to your hand and minimal shoulder movement. We began seeing a progression everyday with more feeling coming back and some movement coming back but over the past week or so the progression has been very slight. Danny is able to bend his wrist and fingers down but can not flex up yet. He does have shoulder movement as well. He is starting to experience more tingling sensation in the tricep area (which is the area the edema is still located) The decrease in progression causes us to worry but we are aware that this type of nerve damage can take a while to recover and we are still in the early stages. That is why we wanted to join a discussion board with others who have the same DX.

Doing well. Coping with diagnosis
Pain improving. Discussed weaning down on narcotics.
RICE prn
Improving strength in finger flexion and FCR flexion improving.
Lacks all finger and wrist extensaion
No elbow or shoulder ROM returned.
Sensation improving in the hand per the patient. He has returning tingling inthe radial nerve over the hand. New finding. Improving med/ulnar sensation.
Clavicle fracture xray show near anatomic alingment with intact hardware
Continue NWB
Will send to OT for home exercise for ROM and stretching of hand elbow.
Continue gabapentin.
Will refer to ortho hand for dr matthias to eval for brachial plexus injury and comgt

You need to get to the Mayo Clinic asap. Usually if surgery is needed they try to perform it within 3 months after the injury to get the best results. I had mine even being 7 months pregnant. I hope you get to the right Doctors and he gets much better soon. Best wishes.

We have an appointment the 15th with Dr. Murry

Great!

Treatment of brachial plexus injury suffering from 2 years

Hi @lipun93, I moved your message to this existing discussion about brachial plexus as John suggested so that you can meet others like @arlenej @susanacj and @dgroland135.

Lipun, what treatments have you had?