Spinal fusion and possible laminectomy have been recommended!

Posted by bobcinem @bobcinem, Apr 12 8:50pm

My orthopedic doctor and a spine surgeon in his group have recommended spinal fusion and possibly laminectomy. The more I read about it, the more terrified I become! And the success/failure rate (checking multiple sources) is not that great! Recovery from the fusion could take up to 6 months. I also have EDS which could extend that time! I am 73 years old, petite and thin. Does anyone have anything to comment, pro or con? Thanks so much!

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@bobcinem

WOW! That is awful... TERRIFYING! I'm sorry that you went through that!
I have resisted the oxycodone for a weeks, rarely I will take a third, maybe a half, but as the time gets closer (tomorrow's the big day!) the pain gets worse and I can barely get to sleep the pain is so intense... I took half when I went to bed last night (well, about an hour+ after I TRIED to go to sleep! ) And I've been eating laxative gummies but alas, to no avail as of yet... I told my husband to buy me lots of prunes!!

Are you all back in good shape now?

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@bobcinem Thank you. My surgery was several years ago and it was a good thing. I got my life back. I do have some physical issues where one side of my chest doesn’t expand as well because of tightness from thoracic outlet syndrome. I still have issues with getting infections that start in my sinuses and move to my lungs. When lungs don’t move well enough, and with having allergies, there can be phlegm accumulating. After surgery, hospitals give out a device for breathing exercises and this is the reason why. Don’t expect the worst, but just be aware as you go through surgery. The time that I really needed pain meds was with my ankle fracture. That was much more painful and a longer more difficult recovery than cervical spine surgery.

Good luck with your procedure and try not to worry too much. I expected it to be awful, but it was a lot easier than my imagination led me to believe.

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@colleenyoung

@pumpiron3, please note that I removed the imaging study from the public forum to protect your privacy. The image contained personal identifying information. You can post it again if you black out the patient info. 🙂

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Thanks!

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I am so happy with my surgery and pain management. I can yell from the rooftop. It gives me back my life. My advice is that you should have a bunch of consultations with different orthopedic surgeons. If you don’t trust that you’re with the right person. Because I went through a couple decades of aggravation when I landed on the right orthopedic surgeon I didn’t even wait for him to finish his sentence before I said yes let’s do the surgery! Once you have gone through various systems, various doctors various treatments various pain management issues when you land on the right people, you know it. Get lots of references do lots of work be patient and when you get there to the right person, you’ll know it. Good luck.

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@colleenyoung

@pumpiron3, please note that I removed the imaging study from the public forum to protect your privacy. The image contained personal identifying information. You can post it again if you black out the patient info. 🙂

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Thank you for removing the xrays. I didn't realize they had the personal inf
ormation.

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