Wish I had more info 12 years ago...

[SuzyQ]

I had severe hyperhidrosis as child and young adult. The sweat would literally drip from my hands and cause all kinds of problems and situations that you all know about. I consulted with a surgeon about 12 years ago, and he suggested what he called a thoracic bilateral para sympatectomy. After the procedure I severe chest pain, but my dry hands made the pain bearable and it went away after a few days. After a few years I had returning sweating off my hands and underarms under my arms and on About 6 years ago I started doing Parkrun, and I was extremely short of breath which I thought was just because of being unfit. I also noticed that one half of my face was as red as a tomato while the other was pale white. The red side was sweating, the white side dry. It is known as Harlequin syndrome. After almost 2 years of exercising regularly, I still could not run even 5 kms. I experienced being short of breath at rest, and close to feeling like dying when I try to run. My resting heart rate was and still is between 48 and 58bpm. I went to the doctor who did all kinds of blood tests to rule out embolism etc. Tests were all normal, as was the stress and resting ECG. He referred me to a cardiologist who also found nothing wrong. I have taken up cycling about a year a ago and do spinning 3 times a week, which means that I should be more or less fit, but I still have moments that I feel that my lungs are too small and I literally gasp for air. I battle with any uphill and it results in me almost hyperventilating to get enough oxygen. I apologise for the essay, but I thought it best to give the full history. I was wondering if there was any link to the procedure done 12 years ago and my shortness of breath? ps... my poor daughter has inherited hyperhidrosis of all the better things she could have gotten from me...

[admin]

Sorry to hear about your problems , but glad that you are still exercising. On the dry half of your face, do you also have more dandruff on the scalp on that half?

Were you able to run long distances easily before your surgery?

Probably best to go to a professional heart-lung/cardio-pulmonary expert and also a thoracic department at a hospital and see if they can run some scans. Might still not solve anything unfortunately due to the nature of the location of the thoracic ganglions.

My heart rate went down slightly after ETS surgery in 1998, but has cone back up again since then.