Eyecare / Hemifacial Spasm : Medication-induced Non-stop Persistent Eyelid-twitching - How I Eventually Get It Totally Cured By Acupuncture & Other Medical Details




Note : The following article is only meant as a reference material to the intended recipients and advices should be sought from the medical experts to establish the authenticity of its contents. For your information, I get this non-stop eyelid twitching sickness which is diagnosed as one of the symptoms of Tardive Dyskinesia (neuroleptic medication-induced repetitive, involuntary, purposeless facial muscle movements), while living abroad indirectly from depression (Schizophrenia) through subsequent allergy and overdosage of the related-medications (Risperdal)and I hope that the information given below will be useful to the intended readers.


Non-stop eyelid twitching, which is lately referred to as Blepharospasm or Myokymia is actually a symptom of involuntary and uncontrollable movements in the muscles around a person's eyes which in turn make them appear like 'blinking non-stop' to other people.


Generally, the movements of one's muscle is controlled by the nerves around them that in turn receive signals from the brains which ultimately dictate the variety of 'ways' in which such desired movements are to be conducted based on a person's will.


The causes of such non-stop eyelid-twitching symptom in most common cases may just due to short-term stress, over-tiredness, over-straining of one's eyes, occasional anxiety, temporary panic fits and nervousness which in turn can be easily relieved and recover naturally by a good rest, more relaxation and trying to calm oneself down to stop getting anxious, panic and worried and stressful over certain things. In this regard, such phenomena tend to be quite common among certain students and other professionals.


However, in the cases of a persistent uncontrollable non-stop twitchings of the eyelids which only get aggravated rather than improved over time and last for months and even years, it may just probably imply that the nerves around the eyes organ are simply not 'properly functionable' enough to bring about the desired movements of the muscles based on the mental instructions from the brains of a person.


Except for any brain and other eye muscle damages/eye muscle disorders caused by permanent lack of certain nutrients and minerals etc or other irritations to that organ like dry eyes, sore eyes, bacteria infections etc, such a chronic eyelid-twitching sickness may likely be caused by certain disturbances and disorders that affect or weaken the functionality of the nerves around the eyes to bring about the desired movements of this organ based on the person's will.


In this regard, the possible reasons of such chronic non-stop eyelid-twitching sickness may probably due to the causes as mentioned above which is experienced by a person over a considerably long period of time rather than just temporarily. Apart from that, other likely causes maybe be certain traumas, especially the emotional ones, allergy to or overdosage of certain medications that carry such side effects as muscle spasms, particularly photophobia in the case of non-stop eyelid twitching symptom.


In fact, I myself have also been suffering from such a sickness due to allergy and overdosage to such medications like Risperdal and other similar drugs (of which I have stopped taking and replaced with Seroquel so as not to further worsen the non-stop eyelid-twitching problem and to prevent a relapse of that sickness after I get healed). As such, I would very much like to share my own genuine personal experience with you over the course of my treatment of such a sickness and I hope that it will somehow be helpful to a certain extent especially to those who have been having the similar experience as mine and I would to emphasize that it again only is meant as a reference material to anyone reading it.


For your information, I have been suffering from this sickness in the past few years whereby my eyelids also tend to twitch both continuously and uncontrollably without me being able to do anything to control the non-stop twitchings at all. As a result, my eyes would seem like blinking all the while to anyone who looks at me and I totally could not drive, look directly and persistently at the pc or tv screens and most of the times, I simply can’t read any books or newspaper properly.


And I have sought lots of medical treatments and advices as well as apply various kinds of eyedrops, taking various types of vitamins, mineral pills as well as many types of anti-muscle spasm medications from lots of eye specialists, neurosurgeons and psychiatrists (who explain the medical theories mentioned above to me), ENT specialists and other general practitioners, and even have the MRI examinations taken to get my eyes cured , but these efforts turn out to be in vain as they fail to yield any positive results and my eyes still keep on blinking non-stop.


Luckily, just about a year after I suffer from such a sickness, I come across an acupuncture expert who studied and observed closely about my problems and then administer a therapy needle on the part of the flesh at the back of the palm which is about 1.5 cm (applicable to the average grown adults only) vertically from the point of intersection (that would appear visibly when the fingers are closed loosely together ) between my thumb and my forefinger of my right hand (as per illustration attached below to strengthen the weakened and sensitive nerves around my eyes. Kindly take note that this point is located at a much 'fleshy' instead of a much 'boney' area - perhaps you would need to briefly explore that part of your right hand at the same time to locate that point, and I hope you will understand that the hand structures of each person differ from one another. After that, he just ask me to administer an alternative self-therapy of acupressure onto the surface of that acupuncture point for at least 2 hours a day and then consistently for about 2 months.


Basically, the instrutcions that I receive from the acupuncture expert can be generally summarised in such a way that, when the acupuncture point is determined and identified accordingly, the person can then re-open his right hand , and then what the person can do is to sit down, and at the same time press onto the surface of that acupuncture point (using just mild force) with any long blunt-pointed object such as toothpick, a normal writing pen (which is out of ink of course) etc against one's chin (suggested for convenience purpose) for a continuous 2 hours (during any time in a day), and it's preferably to do that when the person is about to go to sleep at night (so that he can have more free time to do it). However , if you are eager to find out the very exact location of that particular acupuncture point to further verify the information given above, I would suggest you to seek consultancy from a licensed acupuncturist.


Please be reminded that a good sleep at night throughout the therapy period is essential for the healing to be effectively done. And a person shouldn't associate oneself again with the underlying causes such as over-straining of the eyes, excessive cafeine intake, allergy/overdosage of certain medication (with muscle spasms side effects) that causes this non-stop eyelid-twitching to the particular person in the first place to avoid a relapse of that sickness, especially after getting cured from it.


Please take note that one should continually apply that method in the case where it proves to be effective in dealing with the eyelid twitching problem (after trying it for about 3 days' time).


For your reference, I get my eyelid twitching stopped the next day after the acupuncture treatment. But when I stop the treatment for the next few days, the twitchings just come back again. Based on the acupuncturist, the explanation for the relapse is such that if one were to apply just one-off / short-term treatment, it would then only serve to disperse the dopamine-disturbing toxin / other 'contaminating agents' around one's eye nerves enabling the twitching to stop just temporarily (without totally purging such toxins / 'contaminating agents' out of the human body). So, it works just like doing a physiotherapy whereby one should complete the whole course of treatment (in this case, applying that self-administered technique persistently for weeks/ a few months) to get the eyelid-twitching sickness totally cured effectively once and for all in the end.


Next, the suggested duration of two-hour period/day (continuous non-stop healing process) for that self-administered treatment is just what I have recommended so far to other persons having the similar symptoms based on my very own healing experience from this eyelid-twitching sickness and the others who suffer from it (who eventually get it totally cured). All in all, it would acutally depend on one's healing progress for the eyelid twitching sickness upon applying that suggested self-administered acupuncture method.


In my case, having done that persistently for 2 months based on his order, my non-stop eyelid-twitching that makes my eyes blinking all the while just totally recover in time and I can drive, work with the pc screens, watch tv, movies and read as well as work like any other normal persons. Besides, actually before I decided to seek acupuncture treatment (as recommended by my friends) to deal with this sickness, I did accept the suggestion of a neurosurgeon to take Botox injections to deal with the problematic eyelid-muscles that caused all the non-stop twitchings. Next, the Botox injections, in fact did give positive results in the first place whereby my eyelids just didn't twitch that violently after being given the injections.


However, upon knowing from the neurosurgeon that Botox injections was actually not an effective cure for this non-stop eyelid-twitching sickness, for the very reason that the medications would just serve to sort of 'half-paralyse' the eyelid muscles without being able to do anything curative to the problematic nerves around the non-stop twitching eye muscles, coupled with the fact that such Botox medications would tend to get immunized by the human body, it would just mean that larger and larger quantities of such medications would be required for each subsequent injection therapy (which last for 3-6 months each) in order to achieve the similar healing effect of the previous ones.


Besides, it was also actually a very expensive therapy as it would cost me about 5,000 dollars for each injection therapy session and hence, to keep on spending such huge sums of money to stop my eyelids from twitching would just be very unreasonable.


Whilst the neurosurgeon mentioned to me also about a surgical treatment to effectively cure the non-stop eyelid-twitching, the operation, apart from being very costly, was also actually a very risky one as its failure may very well bring blindness to the persons being operated. At the same time, even such surgery were to turn out to be successful, it would also be unable to achieve 100% complete healing to anyone being operated in the sense that the eyelid-twitching conditions can never 'look perfectly normal' like the ones who were totally not troubled by such a sickness at all. So, I just eventually gave up the idea of getting a surgery to treat the sickness and chose acupuncture treatment instead to deal with my non-stop eyelid twitching .


Frankly speaking, at first I didn't actually have any faith or confidence in such a needle-based therapy and I hardly believed that these needles alone would be able to get my non-stop eyelid-twiching healed. Next, having received such therapy, my eyelids still twitched violently like before without any improvements.


However, after taking a good sleep at night that particular day after the acupuncture treatment, I just woke up the next day and found that there were lots of dried mucus that stuck around my eyes, and surprisingly, after rubbing away these dried mucus to open up my eyes, my eyelids just don't twitch so violently anymore and immediately I was able to do the simple readings and watch tv as well as work with the PC screen without getting any discomfort. And based on the acupuncturist who dealt with my sickness, that acupuncture point as mentioned in that main article was actually directly interconnected with the bundle of nerves around the eye muslces, and so by administering treatment to it, that will sort of applying some kind of 'reflexology stimulus' to the nerves around the eye-muscles to improve the blood circulation around that area as well as to strengthen these specific nerves and to enable any unwanted metabolism wastes, blockages and toxins accumulated around that eye areas to be effectively purged out of a person's body (through dried mucus around one's eyes) And having applied that therapy on my own as instructed by the acupuncturist, my eyelid-twitching condition just got better and better day after day and within 2 months, the sickness was totally gone whereby my I just appeared to be perfectly normal to anyone who talked to, looked and stared at me until now.


Though the therapy mechanism mentioned above could hardly be scientifially verified and proven by the modern medical science, however, as far as a patient suffering from this sickness is concerned, it is more the very effective cure for such sickness itself rather than all other medical and scientific reasonings that would eventually matter the most to the patients. As such, this is the main reason why I would seek acupuncture treatment as a last resort to deal with my non-stop eyelid twitching sickness.


For your further information, I have also come across quite a couple of people in my real life annoyed by such a non-stop eyelid twitching problem of different causes and degrees of severity, and accordingly, I just recommend the method as mentioned above to them and within weeks, they just experience significant improvements to their conditions after applying this therapy, and after a few months , they just recover totally from this sickness. . And I hope that by contributing this piece of article to you, it will somehow help you to in at least getting a clue about this sickness.


In terms of the acupuncture technique recommended above, since I am not belonging to the medical field or an acupuncturist myself, I thus would not know whether such an acupuncture technique would actually work in the case of genetical eyelid twitching sickness, and honestly speaking, out of so many people to whom I have personally recommended that acupuncture treatment, I have not yet come across any of such cases before. Nevertheless, I am pretty sure that most of the people with non-stop eyelid twitching problems actually get this sickness from other post-birth causes rather than genetically, and I believe that once the acupuncture point is clearly identitified, the recommended technique would work effectively to provide reliefs to the ones suffer from post-birth causes-induced non-stop eyelid twitching sickness.


Another thing is that since the ones to whom I have personally recommended such acupuncture treatment for the treatment of non-stop eyelid twitching sickness are actually all grown adults, the "1.5 cm measure" mentioned in these articles mentioned above would thus definitely not be applicable to the young children whose hand structures are naturally very much smaller. Next, given that the skin textures of small children tend to be very much delicate and tender, and hence more fragile than that of the adults, they thus should definitely be attented to by the licensed acupuncturists to deal with their eyelid-twitching problems in the case where they choose this choice of therapy.


Lastly, I sincerely wish that the ones troubled by such an annoying non-stop eyelid twitching sickness can recover finally from their illness. Thank you.



Diagram of The "He Gu" Acupuncture Point :






Note :

Based on the feedbacks and responses so far from the ones (both in my real life and those seeking helps from me through email) applying this suggested self-administered acupuncture therapy for chronic, especially medication-induced rapid non-stop eyelid twitching / eye-blinking disorders,it just turns out that empirically the longer blunt-pointed object such as the normal writing pen (which is out-of-ink of course) etc is much more effective and practical (than a toothpick) for this suggested cure especially when it comes to applying the instrument-aided pressings on the specified "He Gu" acupuncture point as mentioned in the post above. Besides, since it won't cause much undesirable physical annoyances to its users, it is thus a much more user-friendly implement for this suggested acupuncture technique.

Please refer to the following weblinks for further information about the acupuncture point & other medications mentioned in the articles above :




Illustration of
The Acupuncture
Point :

http://curezone.com/upload/Art/Animation/Attachment_File.gif


Details of
The Acupuncture
Point :

http://www.acuxo.com/meridianPictures.asp?point=LI4&meridian=Large%20Intestine



Risperdal :

http://www.drugs.com/risperdal.html



Seroquel :

http://www.drugs.com/seroquel.html



Botox :

http://www.drugs.com/cdi/botox.html

Traditional Acupressure Vs Acupuncture Cure Suggested Above




Based on the acupuncturist who deal with my chronic eyelid-twitching sickness, unlike the other traditional method of acupressure which involves the use of fingers to press and massage the acupuncture point, the use of blunt-pointed object as instructed to me for the treatment of such chronic eyelid-twtiching is actually both intended as a substitute for the acupuncture needle and meant as a 'leverage' to provide an adequately focused and hence a 'reflexology stimulus' that is strong enough to deal more precisely and effectively with that acupuncture point as mentioned above.


Whereas, if that acupuncture point is to be treated with fingers, the stimulus effect generated would be very much smaller due to the fact that such pressings and massagings would reasonably not last long enough to provide any reliefs for the chronic eyelid-twitching. Besides, given the larger suface area of the fingers as well as their rounded physical shape (compared to the blunt-pointed objects), a large part of the forces produced from such pressings and massagings would then be reasonably applied onto the related muscles rather than directly onto the intended nerves through the related acupuncture point to deal effectively with such sickness.

Conclusion


In the first place, I would consider myself really fortunate enough to eventually get totally cured from such an abnormal eyelid twitching sickness which is a symptom of Tardive Dyskinesia caused by prolonged intake of Risperdal.


I don't know really much about the levels of compliance for the established medical ethics for the modern western countries of U.S and other European nations, but as for the country that I live in, which is not as modern or developed, such an issue tends to be ignored by the related medical personnel. To be really frank with you, the psychiatrist who prescribes Risperdal to me in the very first place just dispenses this medication to me more as a mere 'routine' each time I visit his practice and he has actually never notified to me the underlying side effects of such medication when it is taken for the long-term. And even when observing my abnormal eyelid twitching symptom that appears to be more and more obvious to him, he also choose to ignore it and just keep asking me to continue taking the medication.


For your further information, Tardive Dyskinesia syndrome tends to be a rare medical term which is rather unfamiliar to most of the medical personnel in my home country. As such, initially when I sought treatment for my abnormal eyelid twitching, most of the normal medical specialists actually failed to associate such a symptom with the Risperdal drug that I had been taking. In the end, I found the right medical experts who have informed knowledge of my conditions in the expensive private medical centres and honestly speaking, the medical details that I included in my articles were actually told by them during my numerous visits to their practices.


Whilst by the time I have totally recovered from such a sickness, I resume my work in my former firm and at the same time I also undertake a committment as a part-time social worker for my religious body with the main duty of providing counselling services to the in-patients of certain psychiatric wards and dwellers of certain special-care nursing homes. Similarly, most of the doctors-in-charge of these facilities, based on my interviews with them, also tend to be very much ignorant about the adverse side effects of such anti-psychotic drugs, and as a result, the persons taking such medications would tend to be the ones suffer unknowingly from their potential side effects. For this reason, I thus feel that the welfare of these people has been rather 'unintentionally neglected'.


As such, by posting these articles over the net, I just hope that I could promote a higher level of self-awareness among the existing persons taking such anti-psychotic drugs about such syndrome of Tardive Dyskinesia and the need to take the necessary precautions against it. Thank you.

Tardive Dyskinesia Phenomena - Follow-up


With all due respect, in regard of the phenomena explained in my prior message, I would like to highlight to you that the young children in my home country would always tend to be the ones who suffer most innocently and painfully from the ordeals of the bodily-damaging side effects of such Tardive Dyskinesia syndrome owing to their much more vulnerable physical conditions and weaker immune system.


Based on what I have observed so far, such children would eventually tend to have a very much lower self-esteem and in most cases, lead an underprivileged life getting alienated by their peers due to their 'funny looks'. In other words, their lives are basically ruined permanently by the time they get such a sickness.


While their parents, especially the mothers would always tend to immerse themselves in deep anxieties and grave sorrows worrying from time to time about the 'undiagnosed conditions' of their children as well as their unpromising future whilst at the same time simply do not even have a clue of what exactly is going on.


Therefore, I would like to make an appeal and imploration to the related parties to have the necessary mercy and sympathy on humanitarian ground for the sorry plight of these people in the hope of putting an end to such tragedies and misfortunes.

Summary :


Tardive Dyskinesia actually falls under the EPS (extrapyramidal symptoms) syndrome which may well include dystonia, parkinsonism etc.


Such EPS syndrome (especially physical movement disorders, including Hemifacial Spasms triggered by bodily chemical imbalances) in turn is caused by disturbances to the dopamine receptors (one of the main neurotransmitters essential for the control of human body motions) in the nervous system which is normally induced by most of the AAP's (atypical antipsychotics).

Extrapyramidal Symptoms (EPS) - Brief Introduction


Please refer to the weblink below for medical details about Extrapyramidal Symptoms (EPS) :



http://www.hubin.org/publicfamilyinfo/treatment/side_effects/side_effects_6_en.html

Issues of Medical Ethics In Less Developed Nations


In the context of such modern nations as U.S and other developed European nations whereby most of the medical personnel are subject to the strict professional protocol especially in terms of dispensing the medications with potential disastrous side effects to their patients, the medical welfare of this group of people would be greatly ensured in such a case.


Unfortunately, I am just simply one of the many victims of gross negligence of the so-called licensed medical specialists of a less-developed country who care about nothing but the medical fees that I would pay to them in return for such problematic and defective drugs regardless of any bodily damages that these medications have inflicted upon me as visible and readily observable by these group of unethical medical professionals each time I pay regular visits to their practices for 'regular supplies' of such problematic medications.


Next, when such group of related patients in my home country start to have doubts about the disastrous side effects of the antipsychotic medications dispensed regularily to them and actually question the related 'medical experts' about such issues, invariably almost all of these 'professionals' will try to shirk their responsibilities by keeping them in the dark by saying directly 'I don't know what has exactly happened to you as I'm just a psychiatrist and not an eye doctor, chiropractic doctor etc' and they would then refer the related patients to other medical specialists of other fields who would in turn give other misleading diagnosis about their actual neurological / neuromuscular sicknesses to these poor patients (even when those problematic medications are presented face-to-face directly to them in their own practices). All in all, there seems to be a 'tacit conspiracy' between these medical personnel in my home country to work against the medical welfare of these poor patients and to put it bluntly, they are just paying these doctors for those seemingly 'logical and plausible lies' about the actual medical conditions they are having exactly. Next, to further worsen such a pathetic situation, my home country tends to become a 'dumping ground' all the while for decades for the outdated medications with greater unwanted side effects from such modern nations as U.S and other advanced European countries.


Frankly speaking, as a part-time social worker working for the welfare of these poor group of people and a former victim myself who has suffered painfully like them, I hope that by airing these facts and my views through the internet, such a saddening scenario will be exposed to more and more benevolent individuals and such an exploitation would come to an end one day. Thank you.

Further Follow-up :


Please refer to the weblink below for a further follow-up of the posts made above :


http://www.als.net/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3339

Underlying Truths About Antipsychotics / Neuroleptics Meant For Mental Disorders




Given below is a weblink giving some general details about the antipsychotics / neuroleptics and other mental-disorder-related medications as well as analysis about the underlying miscellaneous mental disorders themselves.



For your further information, among the people seeking helps from me so far for their 'apparently unexplainable' chronic rapid eyelid-twitching / eye-blinking, many of them are actually having such a symptom as a result of the neuromuscular / neurological / nerve-disrupting side effects of many antipsychotics / neuroleptics, especially the ones pertaining to the older versions / first-generation ones.



Besides, I also would like to share with the intended readers the things that I have learnt so far in the course of perfoming my duty as a part-time social worker dealing with the mentally-illed in-patients of certain government-funded psychiatric wards and special-care nursing houses of my home country.



Thus, I hope that these additional information given will serve as useful reference materials to the intended readers. Thank you.


http://www.als.net/forum/default.aspx?g=posts&t=46984