@cal77 The earlier they catch it, the better, because there's less nerve damage that has to heal. I limped into the ER using a cane on a Monday morning, deteriorated gradually over the week, and woke up from a nap in my hospital bed Friday afternoon suddenly unable to move my legs at all: they rushed me in for 10 hours of emergency spinal surgery in the wee hours of the next morning.

If we'd caught it a week or two earlier, when I could still use my legs (albeit with poor balance and staggering sideways a lot), my recovery might have been weeks instead of a couple of years. So there's a chance they reached your husband's in time.

In my case, at least I could still wiggle one toe slightly, so they knew that my spinal cord wasn't completely crushed and that there was hope of some recovery (though they didn't expect it to be as good as it was; it wasn't at all clear at the time that I'd ever walk again unassisted, and the rehab centre trained me for life in a wheelchair).