Hi there wondering if anyone can help could this be chiari malformation ,for the last few years i have been suffering from a variety of distressing symptoms which sometimes can wax and wane.I had tia attack 4 years ago in brainstem region and eventually they diagnosed hole in heart which they said was probable cause.However i have had numerous strange symptoms since then including dizziness,sometimes ver brief acute vertigo,imbalance,pins and needles in upper limbs which can be there for few months then vanish,headaches ,visual disturbances which only last for about a second,stiffish neck which feels burning sometimes,muscle and joint pain an fatigue,a definite horner's syndrome that came and went after 3 months, to name a few as well as a few mysterious attacks of angioedema.I have had numerous tests done which include 4 mri scans(1 was an mri/mra and another was done with contrast dye)2 ct scans and 1 ct angiography done to look at blood vessels in brain,3 Lumbar punctures and numerous blood tests performed.all the scans were completely normal except for 1tiny high signal region in the left centrum semi ovale which was present in all scans and unchanged on them all.All blood work normal including ANA,compilment andantibodies to extractible nuclear antigensnegative,liver and kidney function normal,hiv negative.The only abnormal test is my lumbar puncture which has shown a mild but very slightly increasing pleocytosis(6wbc,17wbc,26wbc over 3 years but csf protein is normal as well as all other csf indicators)can anyone help,thanks paolo.

I can't tell you if it is or not, but the neurologist was so sure that I had it last year and I don't. I am 36 now, but when I was 2, I had menengitis. I have had headaches since I was 15. I have nystagmus (eyes), I was having the pins and needles sensation in my neck and shoulders, neck pain, etc.... I had an MRI of my head and neck and all that it showed was 2 bulging disks in my neck. That was causing the pins and needles sensation and neck pain. He told me that is what he thought I had and it really scared me until we did the MRIs. Have you had one of your neck?

thanks for reply shortysmum:-),no i haven't had mri of neck yet so hopefully that might be next step just very worried about continuing symptoms which make normal functioning difficult but no dx yet

I too would suggest an MRI on the C spine area.Something is affecting your sympathetic nervous sysytem as you stated you have had a horners syndrome occur?i have some rather extensive spinal nerve and spinal tract damage,along with a damaged SNS all due to a surgery I had to have done to remove a cavernous hemangioma from the C 7-T 1 area of the spinal cord.i still have some of it left in there that was too dangerous to remove.The SNS actully runs through the area of the C 8 nerve,and this is exactly where my cav was.the only way you can get a horners is when "something' directly affects the sns.The c 8 nerve area also has like a sort of 'junction box' of nerves running through it that do loop back up into the facial area so you can have a host of facial symptoms from some sort of C spine problem.the actual SNS chain runs along both sides of the vertebral column all the way down through the L spine.So anything unusual along that area will also affect the SNS.just some thoughts.good luck,FB