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Thank you Amanda. I have not yet contacted my neurosurgeon after my 10 week post op checkup this week. I’m letting the questions pile up first. I should also say I’m not yet convinced that I have a good post op neurosurgeon since he somewhat questioned the need to have had C1 to C5 spinal fusion surgery done albeit by a different surgeon in Florida where it happened. At the time I felt I had no choice but to have it done because of the circumstances. Now my post op checkup “mentions” that it might have been too drastic. Great just what I wanted to hear.
My range of motion is not good as mentioned, and I am exhausted at the end of the day for holding a posture that allows me somewhat normal vision of the horizontal. Is this it for the future?
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@viehberg25 Hello. I would like to add my welcome too, as you have already met Amanda.
Fusions and disc replacement surgeries both have risks and limitations. There can be adjacent segment disease after either of the procedures, but with an artificial disc it may be a lesser degree. Another risk of the artificial disc is that the body can grow bone around it attempting to stabilize it. The ADR hardware can fail and become displaced, or the screws holding it into the spine can migrate or break. There can be immune responses to foreign materials in the body. I know this sounds like a lot of doom and gloom, but these are real complications that happen.
I think you are right to ask questions. There is some literature about spine surgeons reversing fusions and placing artificial disks, perhaps not for all levels of a multilevel fusion, but for some of them. There doesn't seem to be a lot of surgeons doing this, but you can search and find information. That would also be risks associated with a reversal surgery and careful consideration and multiple opinions should be considered.
Here is a link that I found to a case report.
Case Report
Reversal of Anterior Cervical Fusion with a Cervical Arthroplasty Prosthesis
Sekhon, Lali H. S MB, BS, PHD, FRACS
Author Information
Journal of Spinal Disorders & Techniques 18():p S125-S128, February 2005. | DOI: 10.1097/01.bsd.0000117545.88865.b9
https://journals.lww.com/jspinaldisorders/Fulltext/2005/02001/Reversal_of_Anterior_Cervical_Fusion_with_a.19.aspx
This might open up more questions, and it sounds like there are no easy answers. I'm sorry that you didn't have the opportunity to get second opinions when you were sent to emergency surgery after your injury. If you do seek other opinions for further surgery now, get the very best surgeon you can find, and it may be hard to find one who would be interested in a revision of your present condition. If you search medical literature, you can find names of surgeons who are authors and have studied this type of procedure.
Most of head turning is done by C1 & C2 with some help from C3 & C4, so I understand why you are having very limited range of motion after all of that was fused. Surgeries at those levels right under the skull require extensive surgical skill. If there is instability in that area under the skull, the risk of spinal cord injury is very serious. You can ask about that too, if your injury represented an extreme risk to your life at the time decisions were made for your emergency surgery.
What is your next step now?