Charlie P

I had a fusion almost three years ago L5/S1and an IDET on L4/L5, been totally pain free for over a year.

I had spent years eating everything from percoset to vicidin. I really don' t even notice any loss of movement. I guess I' m one of the lucky ones.

To anyone with back problems good luch,it' s a tough road.

atlasman

I posted what I did to clear up what I saw as vey bad information. If you had posted the above quote instead of what you did I probably wouldn' t have even replied. The above quote is a 180 from what you said earlier.



Sorry Thunder but once again you are wrong. 100% wrong. You seem like the kind of guy that will ask the same question 100 times until you hear the answer you are looking for. You are making the grave mistake of confusing " healing" with an absence of pain.

Take for example your current situation. If you take enough of those pills they gave you and you feel no pain............is your back healed??

If you decide to ignore your disc herniation in the hopes that it will get better all by itself with rest and proper lifting techniques then I wish you the best of luck. If you decide to gobble pain pills like M+M' s to pretend it doesn' t hurt, that is fine too. Neither of these methods will provide you any level of sustainable long term healing which you seek.........in the future you will regret the path you chose. Please don' t encourage others to follow such advice.

If anyone out there hurts their back badly please get to a Dr. ASAP. Do whatever you have to to get through the acute stage of pain and get an MRI. Once you have a solid diagnosis on the severity of your problem you can address it with conservative therapy of your choice. Proper spinal biomechanics MUST be restored in order for any hopes of disc retraction/resorption and that is only in minor cases. If your conservative therapy of choice is not helping you in 3-5 weeks it will not help you at all.......seek other avenues. Epidural injections are OK as a method of temporary pain relief but really have no lasting benefits........plus cortisone is a steroid and by nature is destructive to joints(that is why they spread them out so far and will usually only do a series of 3) If your symptoms persist with no signs of relief and surgery looks like an option in your case I would recommend the endoscopic proceedure if suitable for your injury. It is outpatient surgery now and minimally invasive. Basically it just nipps off the disc material laying on the nerve to relieve pain and irritation. More invasive proceedures are laminectomy and fusions which are permanently altering the normal anatomy and function of the spine. It is really a roll of the dice when you are faced with that option. Your response could be anywhere from 100% better all the way to 100% worse. The success rates for spinal surgery are dismally low.

Most importantly, the proper function of the spine has to be restored in order for you to significantly reduce the chance of degeneration/re-injury to that joint or other joints of the spine in the future. Putting a band aid type fix on the problem will only cause it to return 10 times worse in the same area or manifest itself elsewhere creating a whole new problem to deal with.



Thunder.........you may not see it or you may just not want to hear it but I am really trying to help you and anyone else reading this from making a horrible mistake whose consequences could be life long impairment.

I hope you don' t see this differently then it is intended. I really do wish you and all others the best of luck on this long hard road that you are facing. I can only hope you listen to me today instead of wishing you did some day down the road.


Again

Best of Luck

rockytop

Thundermug, I got the same problems with the addition of 4 more herniated disc and spinal stenosis which is a narrowing of the spine. It' s all in my lower back. The good news is, after 3 years of intense pain, epederal steroid shots every 2 months, and not being able to do anything, I am now almost pain free and without surgery and I havn' t had a steroid since last July. I was getting extremely depressed about my future so out of desperation I went to an acupunture, accumassage doctor. After the first visit last july, I walked out of his office a new man. I' ve had two followup visits since then but it' s almost like a miracle. I' m now back to lifting weights and doing 30 minutes on a treadmill 4 times a week. I' m also doing crunches and situps, something I wouldn' t have even tried before the accupunture visit. I highly recommend it.
Here' s how it works. I lay on his table and he sticks about 20 of them needles in my back (painless). With the needles in my back, I lay there about an hour. What that does is relax the muscles and nerves enough so they can be manipulated by his fingers. He then takes the needles out and does accumassage with his hands and he does it hard, in fact, it usually bruises me and I don' t bruise easy. But, you wouldn' t believe the results. I think it' s worth a try. I' ve sent 4 people to this guy, two of them had the same results that I' ve had. The other two wasn' t quite as successful but they helped.
My back was so messed up that I had 3 different back doctors tell me that surgery was out of the question. All they had to offer was the steroids, physical therapy, and rest. It didn' t work for 3 years. The accupunture did the first visit.
The funny part is my insurance was paying $1200. bucks every 2 months for the steroids and they will not pay a penny for the accupunture and it' s only $45. a visit.
Anyway, it' s worth trying and good luck.

rookelkhunter

How dare you question the knowledge (i.e. opinion) of Mr. Mug! For that mistake, you will now pay Atlasman.

How ' bout this. How ' bout ya' ll list your credentials to clear up any confusion as to whom should or shouldn' t be handing out free medical advice in a bowhunting forum. Then we could set up a vote thread, and he would be deemed the house doc. Just a thought.

My two cents, go see two of the best doc' s you have in your area....then gather all the info you have and fax them to a doc at the Mayo for a third opinion, of which you will be charged for a single visit, without actually making the trip to MN, AZ, or FL. If you need a number for a contact, feel free to email me.

thundermug

Rocky, I was asked if I had tried that and told the Dr. no. I never thought about that and was never told about it until I was asked if I' d tried it.

thundermug

Atlas, I only quoted what I got from Mayo clinincs website. You gotta admit Mayo has a lot of respect in the medical community. It also is the same info I got from my personal physician, and a spine specialist.

atlasman

Just trying to help Thunder.

I really do think you are equating healing with an absence of pain.......when in fact they are 2 totally different things.

If you feel comfortable with the information you have gotten then by all means stick with it. I hope these people were nice enough to tell you what effect years of pain meds and NSAIDS will have on your liver and kidneys.......not to mention what will happen to that unstable joint after years of " pretending" it isn' t injured.

I really do wish you the best of luck.


P.S. I am not trying to dismiss the Mayo clinic in any way.............but at the same time I wouldn' t exactly say the reputation they enjoy has as much to do with treatment of disc herniations vs. disease diagnosis, treatment and cutting edge research and proceedures. It is a wonderful place though.


Get back in the woods soon buddy

No pun intended

thundermug

Not really. I' m just happy to be able to sleep all night, and be able to get out of bed without help.

Thanx

thundermug

OK lets vote! who thinks Rookelkhunter is a jerk?

thundermug