John Paul,

I'm a newbie here, too, but my radical neck dissection was 2 years ago, so I can relate to what you're going through. It's great to ask a lot of questions at this point, and it may turn out that a less-than-radical dissection is in order. I'll keep a good thought for you as you go to see the ENT tomorrow.

As I said, I had the radical dissection. The loss of the spinal accessory nerve meant that I lost strength in my right arm. In time, I lost strtength in my left arm and started to experience a lot of pain in both shoulders. I let 9 months go by (silly me) then insisted on some sort of solution. A referral to physical therapy started a painful rehabilitation, but within a month I had a lot less pain and a whole lot more mobility. I continuted the exercises on my own, and today I have almost full (95%) use of my arms/shoulders and rarely notice pain. (I had to invest a lot of pain to get the gain, but it was worth it!)

Ask your questions. Make the best choice for you. But know that there is a bright light down the road.

Ken