Pain After Seizure - Lose Breath - Epilepsy Message Board

digawid · 04-06-2005, 06:25 PM

I posted this on the General Health board and thought I would try here too.

My husband has Epilepsy - grand mal. He recently had 2 seizures back to back. At the end of the first seizure when he was still disoriented he began mumbling about his back and trying to stand. I had a time trying to get him to stay on the couch because he started thrashing around trying to get up. After he came out of it he was hurting pretty bad and having a hard time breathing. I took him to the ER, the doc just poked him and said aww that's muscle. Gave him a shot of muscle relaxer and sent us home. He then had the second seizure after we got back home. We have been to the doctor three times since then and each time they do the same thing, poke him and say muscle. It has been just over a month and he is still hurting. We can't tell if it is his back or chest. He wakes up at night every 30 minutes or so because he hurts so bad. He grunts from the pain when moving around doing normal activities. If he sneezes or coughs he loses his breath. His sneezes get cut off half way through and then he sounds like someone who has had the air knocked out of them, barely sucking air back in, and his face gets beet red. None of these doctors have bothered to do an xray or any other test. I personally believe he is getting bad treatment because he doesn't have insurance. None the lesswe need to figure out what is wrong. I can't seem to find any info for these symptoms anywhere. Anyone ever had anything like this????????

mnt89 · 04-07-2005, 12:13 PM

It could be true about the insurance, sad to say. Several years ago if I went to the hospital with seizure problems, they would get me right in and right out and not do or tell me anything. Now, I am covered through my own health plan from my job and also from my wife's health plan, and in August of 04 I went to the ER and was admitted (for the same thing I had gone for before.) They did numerous tests, and treated me like royalty. I know they aren't supposed to do it that way, but I believe that they will cut treatment short on people without insurance. My, cousin, also with seizures & no inurance, was able to get services,x-rays,scans, etc., by going through our local health department. Have you tried anything like that? I have experienced upper back pain afterward, but it usually passes after a few days. Good luck in your search for answers.
Mike

digawid · 04-07-2005, 06:14 PM

The insurance thing really bothers me because there are so many ppl who can't get any and it isn't fair at all. I am going to put my husband on my insurance from work the next enrollment period which will be in June. He used to have insurance with his job and he got laid off because the company moved to Mexico. The company was reopened by different owners and he went back to work there but they do not offer the insurance. We have been putting off adding him to my insurance because it is 200 dollars a month and that is a pretty good chunk for us. He takes Lamictal and Dilantin and he was able to get assistant with the Lamictal through that company's drug program, thank god because the price is outrageous. I am going to make him an appointment with a diff doc and I am going to insist on xrays because something has got to be wrong. Thanks for ur post.

Ishy · 04-07-2005, 09:41 PM

I woke once after a fit with the most incredible pain radiating thru my chest.
As I could feel it in the front, the hospital that I was rushed to ran all sorts of haert tests etc but said it must just be muscles and heal within a week or two.

After a few months of still having alot of pain, i went to my local gp who ran some xrays and found that the fall and seizure had actually caused crush fractures in my spine, around t3 to t5.

Still to this day it hurts some days, but not like it did. It hurt like hell to sneeze, take a deep breath, cough, move..it was bad.

digawid · 04-08-2005, 10:55 AM

See I was worried about a slipped disk or something. I massaged down his back and put pressure on each spot down his spine to see if there was any sensitivity and there wasn't. He is sore and sensitive to each side of his spine in the center of his back. It is swollen a little in those spots.