From what I’ve read on here, Dr Hepworth is just very thorough, & wants to rule out any other possibilities before he goes ahead with surgery for ES, so just because he’s doing this testing it doesn’t mean that he won’t offer you a styloidectomy if it’s the right thing to do. Other members have been through this like you. THere’s a couple of discussions with people’s experiences & a link to a research paper JustBreathe posted before which you might find interesting…
There is a mention in the second one about not being checked with head in certain positions, so if you get to see one of these doctors as we’ve said something to ask about.
From what I’ve heard on here recently, Mr Axon who did my surgery in the UK (& is the most experienced ES surgeon that we know of here) now seem to be following a similar protocol of extra vascular testing before recommending a styloidectomy.