Review of Foreward
@Sunrise81 and
@alixjones2018 thanks both for taking an interest, showing concern and passing along experiences! I was pretty much pain free except for a few cervical fusions from rear-enders and sky diving accidents until one morning in 2015. I awoke with pain in my R hip. It just kept getting worse. I spent the next year going from orthopaedic drs to rheumatologist to neurosurgeons getting repeated expensive MRI’s in the small town where I lived.
Chapter 1
Finally I drove the 5 hrs. RT to “the city “ with Johns Hopkins, several excellent medical schools w/ hospitals and was told I needed a L5-S1 fusion w/ screws & a plate. Simple procedure. I had it done only to discover he used a PCA (patient controlled anethesia) for 24 hrs. after surgery but only oral 5mg.oxc€€ every 6 hrs. after that for pain control until discharge 4 days later!! Brutal.....just freeking inhumane.Lesson here: ALWAYS ask your surgeon how they treat pain!!! He preformed an anterior approach which meant I layed on my back so he cut from my belly to my top rib. Stitches not staples. He told me it’d take a year minimum w/ physical therapy to start feeling better. After a year it was getting worse...a lot worse . I sought out a “revisionist neurosurgeon “@ UMMC ( Univ Maryland Med Center) who was very thorough.He referred me to a neurologist for more MRI’s , EMG’s, nerve conduction studies, CT’s & a myleogram to determine the previous surgery wasn’t healing so the screws, plate & pins were loose, moving around & shredding my nerve endings.
Chapter 2
This 2nd surgeon had to do 2 cervical laminectomies prior to revising my failed lower back surgery so I wouldn’t suffer paralysis this time from laying on my stomach so he could a lateral approach laying on my stomach to scalpel down my back (from my shoulder blades T-11 down to S-1) with 97 staples. At least I was as comfortable as I could be. After 7 days I went home instead of inpatient physical rehab. The 22 yr. old phys. rehab person, who could be my granddaughter almost, did a reassessment the morning I was to be taken by ambulance for 2 weeks inpatient physical rehab and pain management, “ran me through my paces” and determined I didn’t need the extra 2 weeks! #%*!@!!! So an UBER was called and off I went, crammed into the back seat of a teenagers’ compact car, sent 187 miles home across the Bay Bridge on the Friday before Easter weekend when everyone heads to “THE BEACH “ and traffic is hell; overheated cars inevitably at a dead stop in one of the 3 lanes heading east!!
The Novel of the Future
I’m wrapping up this time: now 5 months later and 3 hospital stays for inflammation and the stabilized rod now feels like a fat wooden broom handle....my neurosurgeon and PM Dr. both agree this is the next thing to try. I’m set up for a trail with backloafe*n, mofhe*€n, & maybe Catimeen?
sorry this review of a book I recently read is so long....but when I read the 2nd novella I might have more interesting things to say!!! I’ll keep you posted!
@Nitetrain
ALERT get a metal test prior to insertion otherwise you’ll be in horrible pain and require a surgical removal.
