I would like to know if there are other members out there who previously had no symptoms of 'Chiari' until they had an accident.In my case, I am asking , as our daughter received an electric shock which may have caused her neck to suffer a whiplash type of injury. She had never experienced symptoms which followed this accident, and was diagnosed with Chiari, after several visits to A&E. Neurosurgety followed 10 months later, but she is still in chronic pain and our lives totally changed. a 22 year hold, previously outgoing, bubbly, chatty, happy now spends huge chunks of time lying on the couch in her dressing gown as she is in so much pain. I would like to know if there are others out there who can share with me their thoughts on an injury having this knock on effect please.
In December 2002 I had an unrelated surgery and when I woke up I had pain in my neck, lower back, and numbness and tingling in my hands and feet. The doctor that did the surgery could not tell me why I was having the pain and referred me to a my family doctor for the pain. Before this surgery I had the occasional back and neck pain but nothing to bad or that kept me off of work.
My doctor did x-rays of my back and neck and an MRI of my back and said I had degenerative disk disease, 2 bulging disks and a hemangioma. He didn't do a cervical MRI at that time, but I wish he would have. Over the next 10 months the pain worsened In January 2004 my daughter and I were stopped at a yield sign and a pickup truck hit us from behind. The deputy said was going about 30 mph when he hit us.
We were referred to a Chiropractor (which I now know was a huge mistake). He took x-rays and said we both had severe whiplash and we went to 3 months of therapy, traction, and manipulation 3 times a week. My pain was so bad I couldn't function. I didn't find out I had CM until 3 yrs ago. I have just been dealing with my chronic pain with medication.
My doctor said that something could have happened during surgery but I would never be able to prove it, So since these 2 incidents happened so close together I'm not sure which one could have caused a CM or If I was born with it and it was just exacerbated by one or both of these.
I am sorry that your daughter is in so much pain and I hope she finds some relief soon!
I had a few headaches to speak of but nothing too bad until I got in a car accident. Right after the car accident I got a horrible headache that never went away.
Yes. I was in a car accident last August and suffered a whiplash injury. 2 weeks later I began to have headaches in the back of my head which continued to worsen and become more frequent. I also began to develop dizziness, right side weakness, vision issues, cognitive issues, etc. I had an MRI which showed Chiari and a Cine MRI which showed blockage of CSF. I had decompression surgery on January 25. I did get relief from the severe symptoms but I still have some vision and cognitive issues. Hoping those continue to get better. I still have a lot of fatigue and neck pain, too. This recovery has been so hard. I had no symptoms prior to the accident. There have been studies done that have shown that whiplash can worsen or cause Chiari symptoms to appear.
i did not start showing chiari symptoms untill i got hit in the back of the head by a case of beer at work. what state do yoj live
i had some great atturneys that one my case in florida.
My Chiari and Syringomyelia pain/symptoms started after I was rearended in July 2007. My pain/symptoms became even worse after I was rearended again in May 2010. I had NO pain/symptoms and felt great prior to the 2007 car accident. I currently have a lawyer handling both cases. In the last year, I’ve lost my job and health insurance. I’m currently trying to get approved for SSDI, which I just received my first denial for. There was an article in Yale News on May 31st 2013 that said that over 20% of whiplash cases result in brain injury referring to a Chiari Malformation…You can find the article on healthnewsdigest.com. So, to answer your question…Yes, whiplash most definitely can cause or bring on symptoms of Chiari. I hope this helps:)
Last July I had an injury to my neck (c5-c6). During my “adventure”, which lasted almost a year. And after about 8 doctors and 7 different diagnoses I finally had a MRI. My chiari was 11 mm hernia toon with 2 herniated vertabrea (which they did nothing about). After I hurt my neck I had constant pain in neck and shoulder blade area on left side along with neasuea and headaches. I am now 13 weeks post op and am feeling better. Before accident I only had migraines. After my accident I had headache clusters and migraines and other stuf which pretty much put a hold on my life. I do hope she gets help and gets better.
All it took for my symptoms to kick in was a trip to an amusement park. It's no fun. It felt like my warranty ran out when I turned 15.
I had headaches before and has an mri for that but they never mentioned chiari, though my neurologist thinks that they may have not done the right kind to find it. However, my headaches got really bad after I was rearended. I had an atv accident theyear before and had no problems bad enough to be worried but when coughing, sneezing, and stretching made my head throb (after being rearended Iinto the car in front of me) the mri showed the chiari. Ironically I had no problems when I was rearended a few years before that. My neurologist thinks being the middle of a car sandwich might have exascerbated all my symptoms to the point I needed the specialist.
For me it was not an accident, but a significant event effecting my body nonetheless.
My symptoms didn't start presenting until after my first pregnancy. At the end I developed pre-eclampsia and HELLP syndrome and needed an emergency C-section, delivering my son one month early. With my second pregnancy, my symptoms got worse, although I remained healthy throughout.
YES, ITS A FACT. There is even a term for it,(cant remember the name). I have read about it, but also, I have friends who work at Stony Brook hospital who did research for me & told me most of the time they see it is after trauma in patients that had no symptoms pior & were undiagnosed, but also, every NS that I saw seemed perplexed when I told them I had suffered no injury or accident due to the fact that my syrinz was so far advanced &the sudden symptoms were NOT brought about that way!! It may be a blessing. HARD TO BELIEVE, RIGHT?? well, I wish I had something jolt the symptoms out of me much earlier. Trust me, if the chiari is there, its better to have the chance to treat it or monitor it as early as possible. You would NOT want your daughter to be told one day that she has a massive syrigz in her spine!! best wishes
Thank you everybody for your replies. I find it so helpful and also a bit of a relief to find out that this is not a rare finding. have been back and forth over the last two years. Aoife has now been accepted on the the Brain injury programme in Dublin, after being reviewed by a number of staff at that particular hospital. This hospital focusses on reehabilitation so I guess we are lucky that they say that there was something that can be done to improve her life. As it stands now, she is 22, stays at home at all times, is in constant pain and though she denies it must be so fed up. pain is so bad sometimes , that she wishes she could just cut off the limb that is in pain at that time.
Again, thank you to everybody why has read and replied to my query, I cannot thank you enough.
I was diagnosed with Chiari in 1999, but showed relatively few symptoms so was able to live a totally normal life.
Thanksgiving 2011 I was rear-ended (at a toll booth in New Jersey by a driving instructor... the joke writes itself) and a month later started having the worst migraines of my life. At the time of the accident I didn't even feel like I had whiplash. Symptoms continued to get worse until my surgery in December 2012.