AboutRonald Levy, M.D. Expertise Associate Professor of Anesthesiology, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. I am a board certified anesthesiologist who can answer all questions related to any type of Anesthesia with the exception of Pain Management.
Question My wife, 37 yrs old, had a spinal anesthesia on 7-15-08, for surgery. Approx. 6 hours after surgery she started experiencing severe headaches instantly when in the vertical position. After several consultations with the anestheologist, they did a blood patch. This made things worse. The headaches when in a prone position are 6-7, on a scale of 1 to 10. In the sitting or standing position, they are a 10+. HELP!. We are doing the bed rest, fluids and as much caffiene as possible. Taking Fioricet 50/325/40 and Vicodin ES. Is there anything else??
Answer Assuming this is a spinal headache (I say that because it usually is not bad when lying supine), the only other thing to do is a repeat blood patch. Basically the treatment consists of bed rest, hydration, analgesics, caffeine and blood patch. If those don't work, I would make sure there is not some other reason for the headache that is just coincidental with the spinal (e.g. aneurysm, etc). I'm not suggesting that this is the problem, but it might be something to look into if the other treatments are not working.
Ronald Levy, MD
Associate Professor of Anesthesiology
UTMB-Galveston
