For those that have had or will be having surgery with Dr Omlie, did he deal with your TOS as well if you have it or do I need to see someone else for that?
Is there a link with tos and eagles?
May be not necessarily causative, but from my observations (based on reading this and other forums, scientific and popular articles, studying biomechanics and human anatomy) there is some noticeable correlation between these things:
- symptomatic elongated styloid process(es)
- loss of cervical lordosis (aka military neck)
- stiffness in shoulders and neck
Stiff shoulders/scapulae/neck may easily represent as TOS (pure body anatomy - scalene muscles go through that area possibly compressing blood vessels and/or nerves)
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I have military neck also, that definitely all correlates with me, I’m hoping the tos will be managed with pt after my eagle syndrome surgery, but as my blood vessels are compressed in my shoulders I am worried about blood clots
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Gotcha. I wasn’t sure if maybe having one could cause a misdiagnosis of the other. For instance can having ES cause someone to be misdiagnosed as having tos or vice versa. I’ve had both diagnosis of bilateral vtos and jugular outlet syndrome at the c1/styloids. I’m starting to wonder if someone I really don’t have tos and the ES is causing my vtos like symptoms which is severe blood pooling in my arms. Not sure how that would be possible but the neurologist that diagnosed me with eagles did say not to mention tos to the surgeon as they may not move forward with a styloidectomy due to possible overlapping symptoms.
The neurology clinic I reached out to in Norway seems to really help a lot with pt for TOS. Might be worth checking out. One less surgery is always a plus. He has a 90 page article on tos and treating it without surgery. His name is kjetil Larsen at msknuerology.
My strongest suspicion is that if one has elongated styloid processes, and tendency to pull down their shoulders, they develop both syndromes. TOS - directly, and Eagle’s - because the skull is being pulled too firmly to the spine, muscles are too stiff and there’s no room for free soft tissue movement anymore. That leads to straightened neck curve as the head tries to resist.
But that’s just one of my theories…
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That’s definitely as good a theory that’s out there. There seems to be a big correlation with posture causing ES and TOS. At least through a lot of videos and articles I’ve seen. Until I got on this forum I never came across anything or anyone mentioning having both. Seems to be a good amount on here with them both.
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@Millymay as @11bravo & @vdm have suggested, TOS symptoms can be mimicked by ES. A fair number of our members who’ve been diagnosed w/ TOS & ES have noticed significant improvement in their TOS symptoms after ES surgery. If you’re considering surgery for TOS, I’d wait till after your ES surgery to see what improvement you get. Do remember that ES surgery can have a slow recovery because irritated/damaged nerves are poky to heal so it can take a few months post op before you notice symptoms disappearing or reducing.
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I think they do have allot of overlapping symptoms but to me the Eagle syndrome surgery is less complicated and has a better success rate so I’m doing that one first, but blood pooling in my arms is not one of my symptoms, and my Doppler ultrasound for tos only showed concerns when my shoulders are pushed back or my arms are up, so I think pt might be the way to go for me with that, but I have an appointment with one of the top tos guys so I may as well see what he has to say about it
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Sounds like a good plan!
Thank you, The more I read the more I think I’m doing it the right way round, but it’s still concerning, I’ve been lucky so far with no blood clots, I did get extremely ill in October and I’m 50 percent better from that episode now and hoping to stay that way until my surgeries, my left styloid is definitely compressing on my jugular vein so that’s what we are doing first
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^^^ this is gold ^^^
I assume “pushed back” is as in “actively pushed back, using muscles” rather than someone passively pushing them back?
Yes by pushed back I mean military position, basically standing straight not slouched over squeezing your shoulder blades together
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My TOS pain on the right side has disappeared since ES surgery two days ago. I know it is too early to tell but no pain there since surgery. They removed a 7.2 cm styloid.
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That’s good to hear
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Great news, @Cody!! I hope the symptoms remain gone! If they come back a bit, don’t worry. Post op swelling can cause symptoms to flare when anesthesia & other surgical meds wear off but as your body heals, those symptoms will usually resolve.
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I have nothing to offer about TOS however, wanted to reinforce that you’re in good care with Dr. Omlie! Best wishes to you!
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