Ginger Wolnik Brain Surgery

Ginger Wolnik Brain Surgery - April 3, 2023

Ginger was diagnosed with Trigeminal Neuralgia in 2011 after several years of mysterious minor "tooth" pain in the lower left jaw. After years of outbreaks and remissions, the outbreaks became more severe and the remissions shorter, which is common. Fortunately, this was Type 1, or "classic" form, which is more treatable. The pain was managable with medications such as Lyrica, but the side effects made it difficult to increase the dose when the pain became more intense.
In early February of 2023, a new outbreak started that was the most severe in years. On March 13, Ginger got an appointment at the Stanford Pain Clinic to talk to a neurologist and asked for a referral to Dr. Steven Chang at the Stanford Trigeminal Neuralgia Program for a consultation on surgery. On March 24, Dr. Chang reviewed her brain MRI images taken in December 2018 at another clinic and said he could see where the problem was and that Micro Vascular Decompression Surgery had an 85% chance of permenantly curing it!
The surgery was performed on the morning of April 3, 2023 at Stanford Medical Center in Palo Alto, California, which is a complex of hospitals on Stanford Campus. Ginger was in an operating room in L Tower for 4 hours, 38 minutes and Dr. Chang inserted 4 cushions between a tangled artery and her trigeminal nerve, and another cushion on a nearby vein. During the surgery, Dr. Leslie Lee monitored the auditory nerve to make sure there was no damage to the hearing on that side! She also monitored nerve activity from several of the cranial nerves and was able to confirm that spontaneous firings ceased after the separations. So even before Ginger became conscious in the recovery room, the team knew they had probably succeeded. Ginger woke up with no more trigeminal nerve pain and has not had any since!
Ginger was able to go home on April 6.

Map of the trigeminal nerve, Ginger's pain was perceived in the V3 branch