• ETS was banned in Sweden – it’s birthplace – in 2003 after overwhelming complaints of side effects and disabilities resulting from the surgery.
• 51% of ETS patients have reported a decreased quality of life.
• Sympathectomy can have adverse changes in how your nerves function and alters many bodily functions including lungs, eyes, heart rate, heart stroke volume as well as the autonomic nervous system.  This means your brain may be unable to make the normal automatic adjustments to your environment, emotions, everyday stimuli etc.
• ETS interrupts messages from your brain that would normally travel to many of your organs, glands and muscles.  In fact, your brain will be unable to communicate with a significant proportion of your body once the surgery has taken place.
• Studies have shown that ETS surgery physically causes psychological changes.
• A common side effect of nerves damaged (in ETS) re-sprouting is known as Frey’s syndrome.  This triggers abnormal facial sweating and excessive sweating when eating.  Even the smell of something can trigger excessive sweating as the signals to the brain are mixed up.
• You may well notice changes in sweating throughout the rest of your body – 25-75% of people experience this.
• One Compensatory Sweating (CS) study shows that as many as 30.9% of people suffer from severe sweating – and around a quarter of those patients described the side effect as ‘major and disabling’.
• Finnish Health Care Authorities have produced a 40 page review that ETS is associated with ‘significant and long term side effects’.
• Chronic pain can develop after surgery due to damage of nerves.  This pain can’t be cured as once nerves have been damaged, there’s no way of reversing it.
• Some ETS patients need to have a pacemaker fitted after surgery as their heart rate slows down considerably and dangerously.
• Reversal must be performed within a few days/weeks but it’s wise not to expect to recover to pre-ETS health as the chances are so slim they’re almost non-existent.
• One study has shown an increase in sweating by ETS patients – by comparing before and after results.
• Be prepared to stop exercising – your ability may well be diminished after having ETS.
• ETS has a far too high rate of regret attached – one study of patients shows a very low rate of satisfaction in 28% of people.

These facts and figures all stack up, the risks are significant – Russian Roulette springs to mind – at best it’s a huge gamble.  As these statistics are so damning, why is ETS actually still an option outside Sweden?  Why are some surgeons ignoring these studies and claiming ETS has a 100% rate of success?  My own thought on that final question is yes, technically speaking, ETS cures sweaty hands.  Omitting to relay the rest of the information is hardly the sign of a trustworthy professional in my book.

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