Posted by westernjoe on September 18, 2008 at 15:08:11:In Reply to: Re: MMA & UPPP 1.5 years ago no good :( posted by vee6zee on September 18, 2008 at 14:38:47:
It's good that MMA opened your airway some. If you have base-of-tongue obstruction due to its size, MMA would have at least helped that. If you get your tongue dealt with and that solves it, you will never really know if you would have had to go back and do MMA if the tongue was done first.
Somewhere recently on this forum someone was talking about a submucosal tongue reduction procedure of some sort. Maybe they will chime in here. Tongue surgery is mostly considered scary and invasive so isn't done much, but I'm hearing about it more and more.
There is RF (Somnoplasty) but if your tongue is really big then it probably will not resolve the issue. It will reduce volume and stiffen the surface up.
There are 2 other surgeries you didn't mention - GA and Hyoid suspension. They both work on positioning the tongue forward.
One possibility to confirm the tongue issue would be to get a sleep endoscopy. They are not common and you might have to go to CA, and many Drs will discount the results.
Keep plugging away. That's what it takes to solve osa.
RA