I have right side eagle syndrome - 3.2cm. Left side is 1.9cm (normal). I also have neck and shoulder muscle tightness. I am also told of the tech neck problem. The main problem likely due to ES to me is speech and throat pain after speaking for few minutes. Basically the pain is at the base of the tongue. After a long talk I also run out of breath.
One of the most annoying part is that I continuously have to fake swallow since it seems due to muscle spasm and that happens in-between while I am speaking. This makes my social interaction very odd.
I believe that fake swallow/throat clearing/base of the tongue pain/throat pain is due to the ES. I am not 100% sure yet if the tight shoulder and neck muscles on the both sides are due to the ES but it may be due to the posture since I work in front of the computers as full time from multiple decades.
I am going to get nerve block once approved for glossopharyngeal nerve and my neuro thinks that once that works and some of the speech/throat symptoms goes away it will be 100% confirmation before we go for the surgery.
Just thought of sharing here, since suffering w/ above symptoms from last 1.5 yrs, initially we thought it is due to my deviated septum (bit of breathing issues while speaking and throat pain/tightness) but even after the septoplasty the symptoms didn’t improve.
Tried amitriptyline for 5 days and I couldn’t handle that medicine.
Welcome to our forum. ES symptoms can include neck & shoulder muscle tightness & pain because the spinal accessory nerve is one of the nerve often irritated by elongated styloids. Your speech problem is being caused by the vagus nerve. We’ve had a number of members who have either lost their voices or struggled w/ pain when speaking. The vagus nerve also controls breathing, heart rate, blood pressure & gastrointestinal activity among other things. I had blood pressure & heart symptoms from ES, The tongue is also often affected by ES because the glossopharyngeal & hypoglossal nerves can be irritated w/ the glossopharyngeal nerve being the more common problem. I had the feeling of tremendous pressure at the base of my tongue as one of my symptoms & that feeling was gone when I awoke from my second surgery. The other three cranial nerves which can be impacted by ES are the trigeminal, facial & vestibulocochlear nerves.
You’ll get some good information from the link below. Jules has written a number of explanatory posts that start w/ “ES Information” so you can search those two words & the list of her posts will come up for you.
Hi & welcome to the site! A shame the Amitriptyline didn’t help you, but there are other nerve pain meds you could try- Gabapentin, Lyrica, Carbamazepine etc…I hope the nerve block is definitive for you, let us know how you get on!