I have an AVM in the palm of my hand. Do any of you good folk know any surgeons in Australia who would have experience with removing AVMs from extremities and would be prepared to walk me through the operation? I am based in Hobart, Tasmania and both of the vascular surgeons that I have spoken to have been recticent to perform any operation. I feel that this has severely limited what I can do in life (with respect to exercise and playing musical instruments) and I would like to take steps to rectify it. Thank you.
Hi Krabo, Sorry for the late reply to your post. We live over the ditch in NZ - my husband Warwick has an AVM in his wrist/hand also. We went to Dunedin hospital which is a university hospital and the professor who treated Warwick has a great reputation here - he’s a bit like Doctor House - marched all his student doctors in to diagnose Warwick’s issue and you could tell they were terrified of him. Warwick quite liked it as they were mostly beautiful young ladies. He told them - “you will probably never see this again in your lifetime” so that tells us it’s extremely rare. What he told us was that it is not possible to treat high blood flow (artery) issues and our best course of action is to just leave it alone and treat the hand with care.
I hope this helps and am curious to know if you ever had anything done with your AVM.
Margy