Posted by CaffeinePoet on June 25, 2010, at 9:19:55
I'm a 34-year-old programming student in Madison, WI.
In March of this year, I suddenly started experiencing daily, 24-7 blurred vision across my whole visual field that worsened in intensity when I did anything vasoconstrictive (drank coffee). Eventually word-finding problems followed, and memory problems. A week on verapamil ER cleared up the visual symptoms immediately. I still have some intellectual processing problems, that i expect to clear up in time if the diagnosis is accurate. If the diagnosis is accurate, I've had some migraine activity nearly nonstop daily for 3 months.
An MRI and CT Scan (non-contrast) have showed nothing, no infarcts, mild cerebral atrophy over and above that expected for my age. My bloodwork has been normal as well. A fluroscein angiograph of the eye and retinal scan have also been normal.
My doctors are leaning towards BAM, because I was diagnosed with BAM in 2002. In July 2003, I went on a low dose of Effexor and it was so effective that I forgot altogether about the migraine condition. Sure, I'd have some visual weirdness and some word-finding problems sporadically, but nothing that bad. I told my friends I had weird migraines, that's it. These symptoms came on about 3 months after stopping Effexor.
Does this sound like BAM to you? The 24/7 existence of the symptoms for many months seems strange, seems to portend a more serious basilar artery problem, but as my brain scans have turned out normal my MD's are leaning towards migraine as the diagnosis. I want to demand a CTA or MRA to ensure that there really is no arterial disease.
poster:CaffeinePoet
thread:952124
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20100615/msgs/952124.html