I should learn to use the search option! lol I did find several posts concerning this topic. Thanks to all who took the time to post their experiences with this procedure. I have a lot to think about before next week.

I have A fib and they attempted this procedure on me a few years ago. The procedure is not bad. Your leg will be sore for a few days and if they do like mine they will use a plug to plug the artery so it does not bleed instead of sitting with the darn sand bags on your legs for hours. Which I have had done before as well. I don't want to scare you but I also want to let you know what happened in my case which I will stress (IS NOT TYPICAL) My doctor suggested the procedure to me because they could not get my A Fib and other arrhythmias under control she told me it has a 98% success rate and they believed it would be a good option for me. I had this done at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston so a pretty good hospital I went in for the procedure and just be warned ( I was not prepared for this) they may shave your nether regions. I only say this because it caught me off guard but once they explained it I understood why but was still a bit of a OH moment lol. Anyways I went in to the procedure at 12:00 pm. They gave me some sleepy meds and put a bunch of monitors on me including what I thought at the time was 2 giant heart monitor pads on me one on the front of my chest and one directly behind it on my back both left side. They explained to me they would be doing the mapping and I may feel my heart rate go up and down if I was not completely asleep so not to worry. I was actually zonked out! They woke me up at 1:30pm and told me they had mapped out the areas they needed to and were about to start the ablation portion of the procedure. That is the last thing I remember until 4 pm when I woke up coming out of the procedure room. They took me back to the recovery room and my doctor was sitting there waiting for me. She kept lifting my gown and looking at my chest. I kept wondering why she was looking at my chest when they went through my legs. My husband came back to the recovery area and his hair was standing straight up and I could tell he had been crying. By that point I was talking, eating having a drink and everyone around me was acting really really strange. My doctor didn't leave my side, the nurses were fawning over me and my husband was loving on me like I had never seen. Something was up! I finally ask ok what is going on? Why do you keep looking at my chest??? The doctor then explained to me that I went into an A Fib attack on the table during the procedure and they could not get my rate until control and it had shot up to over 600 bpm and chemical conversion did not work and they had to Cardiovert ( use the DeFibber) on me 6xs to bring my rate back and they had had a really hard time stabilizing it even after that. I was like Ohhhhh ok now I understand. I had at that point never been cardio verted outside of using drugs. I still honestly didn't understand how bad it was until I got up to move. I found out they had went through both legs and what I thought was an IV bandage my other arm was actually where they had also went through my arm for something. I felt like I had been hit with a semi in the gut. I could barely walk I assume it was from the DeFib jolts. I was actually on my way home by 5:30-6:00pm after that. Once they watched my heart rate for a bit and made sure I wasn't bleeding they sent me home which shocked me. At that point I was a bit nervous to go home but they assured me I'd be fine (which I was) On the way home I asked my husband why he was so upset, I was fine, I felt fine when I woke up he explained to me then that he had heard the code called to the procedure room, right after the code was called they called him on the phone in the waiting room and told him there was a problem and poor guy had to sit there alone waiting to hear what happened to me all alone. I felt so bad for him. On the hour drive home I was sore but doing ok. When I got home by back and chest started to burn terribly. I hadn't taken my shirt off since I got dressed at the hospital but I kept telling my husband it was burning really bad. I finally went and got changed and when I took my shirt off my chest and back were burnt really badly in the shape of those big giant what I thought were heart monitors. They were apparently stick on defib paddles. I had 3 of them on my chest and back so each one must be good for 2 cardioversions. That night I was in so much pain, that the next morning I had to go to Urgent Care. They told me I had 2nd and 3rd degree burns on my back and chest from that. You don't ever see on TV when they use the paddles on people that they complain of burns or feeling like they have been struck by a semi. My doctor never explained to me that this was a possibility. As far as I knew I was going in for a simple procedure (which it is) but there can be issues. I wanted to let you know about them so that you aren't caught of guard like I was. After all of that they ended up aborting the ablation as they said I had too many bad areas in my heart and they would have to burn too many areas. So for me the procedure was not successful, My next option is a pacemaker/Defib combo which I am waiting for awhile to get. As I said please don't think I am trying to scare you. The catheter part in the legs and the procedure recovery is pretty easy. You do need someone to drive you home and you maybe sore in your legs for a few days, do not lift anything heavy until they tell you you can due to the entry site for the catheter it needs to heal and you need to watch it for bleeding. I was told before I had my procedure that after the procedure I may have a few fluttering episodes but not to worry about them it was normal. I wish you the best and a speedy recovery.

LOL!! More worried about not marking up where just painted. This should have been done before painting but if any of the bottom gets damaged I can work around it (which I think is what the former owner did). So much of the baseboard is in awkward places and not obvious I'm not too worried. What does worry me is getting off what's already there. I have a little cat's claw (paw?) that has been one of my most useful tools. Fortunately, the most obvious place that some one might see was the one with the top of the wall molding and practically fell off the wall.

Our 10-year old cocker spaniel had Total Ear Canal Ablation (TECA) surgery 4 days ago on his left ear. Apparently, his facial nerve must have been bruised which resulted in facial nerve paralysis on his left side. (This is the most common complication after TECA.) His bottom left lip is drooping and the food gets stuck on his left side. He can't blink with his left eye, so we are using artificial tears for his dry eye. He does move his upper left eye lid when he is awake but he can't completely close his left eye when he sleeps. I've been reading online that this facial nerve complication could be temporary or permanent. Most sites state that the facial nerve paralysis is a temporary problem which resolves within 4 to 6 weeks, other sites state 2 months. Has anyone in this forum experienced this with their dog after TECA? Was it temporary or permanent? If temporary, how long did it take to resolve? Thank you for your comments.