You all should now me by now, Hello. : I'm having a Laminectomy Fusion at L5-S1 april 15th.
My symptons are Major lower back pains lately followed by the usually severe electrical shooting pains down the buttocks to below the knee, with constant achy calf or is it spelled calve? What ever. I have major back pain probs were I just cant move sometimes it hurts so bad.
My Q: Is I know that the Lam & the fusion is supposed to help with the leg pains but what about my back.
Could it have anything to do with the tears I have in my discs also (wich this Dr hasnt address but a pain doc has. He wants to stick a wire in the discs to burn them? I guess this fixes the tears but strangly the Nuero hasnt mentioned them to me.
So I want to know is this type of surgery manely for leg pain or is for both. What can be done for severe back pain? besides amputation because if there was such a thing, let me have it,lol.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Dazed and Confused>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Thanks you are all my extended Family,
1 more thing, I was looking back at an old MRI and I was woundering what this meant? Conus medullaris at T12
Last edited by mydogsobe; 03-18-2005 at 08:22 PM.
Reason: left some out
Can't recall which of your disc have tears but it can't be the ones where you are to have fusion. I'm not familiar with the wire to burn the tears, but have had blood patches to seal three leaks. Assume that although you have tears, the disc are still full enough to be the cushion and spacers they were meant to be.
Can the fusion take away the leg pain? I'm sure it depends on each individual's condition as well as the doc, the exact procedure and all other factors. But, the surgery can bring fulll relief. I had total relief when I had my first fusion of L3-S1; no butt pain, no leg pain. The pain of the surgery was so much less than what I had endured, I felt like celebrating. Hope you have the same wonderful success with your procedure.
I believe my annular tears are at L4-L5.
You heard of a discogram or something were they shoot in the dye in the disc to try and reproduce the pain, well the my pain mngmnt doc said that they would rap a wire aroujnd the disc and burn it to make it hard. I asked him if it would shrink the disc, thinking that it my releive pressure on a nerve but he said not it just burns the out side to harden and fix tear.
The Procedure your talking about is called an IDET. It is a noninvasive procedure that is outpatent surgery. The insert a wire where your tear is and heat it for about 15 minutes and it seals the tear so to speak, that is my understanding anyways. It is very contraversial on how well it works and has a long recovery. Also most insurances do not cover it.
My NS wanted to do that and my insurance denied it, so I am looking into fusion or ADR. If Rampage sees this she can tell you more about IDET as she has had a successful one.
