Hello, I ask those who had the surgery, where did your surgeon carry out the incision to remove the styloid?
Did any of you have the scar start from the mastoid bone? I have been told my procedure would be done ‘through the mastoid and into the deeper neck’.
Different surgeons use different approaches for ES surgeries. Some go in through a neck crease which leaves a virtually invisible scar. Others go in behind the ear & slightly down the neck (this is called a facelift incision). Still others go in in front of the ear & then through the neck if the styloid is longer than anticipated or there is a lot of s-h ligament calcification to remove. It sounds to me what your surgeon is describing will likely end up in a neck crease as most of those who’ve had styloidectomies w/ IJV decompression have incisions in their necks.
This is my incision from 10/24 when I had a revision styloidectomy & IJV decompression. I’d already had an incision on this side from my second styloidectomy done in 2015. I think my incisions are pretty inconspicuous.
I marked each end as it’s a bit hard to see at the top.
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Mine was behind my ear, so just in front of the mastoid .
Was there any drilling?
Not as far as I’m aware, but as @Isaiah_40_31 says, there are many different techniques…I did see a documentary recently where surgery was done through the mastoid to get to the skull base, not for a styloidectomy though.
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@markp - Typically there is no drilling in in external ES surgery, the incision is made then the soft tissues under which the styloid is buried are move aside & a ronguer is used to cut the styloid. Some doctors use a type of bone clippers vs the ronguer. There are YouTube videos of both the transcervical & transoral ES surgeries on YouTube that you can watch if you care to.
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