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From: Tim Bates (tim.bates@mac.com)
I too recently had what Dr.'s deemed a vaso-vagal attack. I would like to share a sequence of events that may be helpful.
Friday: I wake with a pain behind my left shoulder blade. I check me own BP which was 150/108. Pain disappears later in the day.
Saturday: I wake with the same pain only this time behind my right shoulder blade. Around noon the right side of my neck feels strange. Like a pull. Kind of a dull pain. Check my BP it is still 151/102. I go to the Dr./clinic. They do EKG and chest x-rays which show normal. They prescribed medicine to lower my BP.
Monday: I arrive at airport for a noon flight. When waiting for a delay my neck starts feeling strange again. Pulling sensation on the front/right. I decide to leave and go to hospital arriving at 3:00 pm. EKG normal. BP 133/86. At 6:00 pm while laying in ER I tell my wife that I feel something coming over me. A minute later I feel a tightness/pain moving up my right/front of my neck. Like a thermometer rising. I feeling of nausea comes. I passout moments later. My rate dropped to 30 from 90. It lasted about 2 minutes. I woke with the staff holding me on the bed. About 10 min. later it started to happen again but not to the point of passing out. When I was moved to a room about 5 hours later it happened again but again I did not pass out.
Tuesday - Friday: I am in cardiac unit on a monitor and I get EEG, EKG, Catscan, X-rays, ultra sound of neck and of heart. All are normal. On an MRI the radiologist sees what the Dr. called a Spontanuous Venous Hemmorrhage near the C2 in my back. The size of a thumbnail with a pooling of blood.
Other: One week prior I started, on my own accord, to take one aspirin per day. I also stopped drinking caffinated coffee one week earlier.
On Friday the neurologist said my episode on Monday was a vaso-vagel attack which may have been brought on by the "spontaneous venous hemmorhage". He took me off the high BP medicine and no aspirin.
It has now been one month and I have had no more VVAs but the right side of my neck, somethings right collar bone area, and the upper part of my back (near C2) continues to bother me each day.