I just went through a surgery in which 4 world class Mayo Clinic surgeons worked on me, 2 on the leg and 2 on the neck, for 4 1/2 hours. They removed the Saphenous vein from my left leg, fileted it and reconfigured it, then popped it back into my neck, somehow managing to not cut any other nerves, arteries, or just cutting my whole head off.
Wow!! This was done two months ago. He had originally been treated for CCSVI, then had stents that clotted and stents within stents that clotted, then had this venous reconstruction done.Kathy and Jake were in the room and I soon learned the procedure was the "easier" of the two, meaning they were happy enough with the subclavean vein to not have to crack open my chest and run the new line into the SVC by my heart. I was prepared for that, but as I mentioned before, I was pretty relieved we didn't have to do that.
This is very big news!Then Dr. Stone and I turned to another topic...namely the Mayo Clinic becoming more of a leader in the CCSVI studies. Dr. Stone told me that although he's done hundreds of vein reconstructions before for patients and it's a well established surgery, this was his first known case for Mayo Clinic performing it for the purpose of improving MS symptoms. He was genuinely curious and deep in thought, perhaps even taken aback by the improvements I was reporting in just 11 days since the surgery.
It was done at the Mayo Clinic in Phoenix, AZ.