Surgery Date with Dr. Cognetti

Hi @Laurah, as @KoolDude mentioned I’m in Winnipeg, Manitoba. You’re probably only the second ES patient I’ve heard of in MB.

Since Oct 2019, I was trying to figure out what my mysterious throat/neck issues that wouldn’t go away and had multiple appointments in and out of the health system. Spent $thousands on chiropractor, massage, physiotherapists, acupuncture, dentists, oral surgeon. Then based on 2019 CT, I had confirmation of bilateral elongated styloids in Jan 2022 and ever since I have been trying to convince my ENT that this is Eagle Syndrome. But even then my ENT still wouldn’t fully commit to ES and admit something was wrong even though I had been suffering with consistent and worsening symptoms since Oct 2019.

I have come across noone in Manitoba that will do the surgery other than Dr. Viallet who has been mentioned to have done someone’s styloidectomy but the ES patient didn’t reply to my post on Facebook group. I read he won’t do surgery on <4cm.

After a very long struggle of being told “it’s muscle”, “it’s acid reflux”, offered PPI when I don’t have GERD and scopes/gastroscopy confirmed no GERD, offered anxiety pills, offered stress management counseling, I gave up on our health system. After much hesitation (only because of the cost, risk of doing out-of-country surgery, plus COVID) I sent my file to Dr Cognetti in May. It wasn’t until Sept 2022 that my ENT finally admitted that my styloid may be irritating my left tonsil. My left jugular compression was not acknowledged/affirmed by ENT because “cancer patients function fine with only one jugular”.

Based on my suggestion, in Sept 2022 I was finally referred to Dr Campbell in Ottawa but I can’t wait any longer for a response. I’m not even sure why I asked for it - possibly hope that by some miracle I could have surgery in Canada. If I have to wait anymore, I will lose my mind.

I have surgery with Dr Cognetti booked in Dec.

2 Likes