Cervical spinal cord stimulators: Anyone had success?

I wasn’t able to get one. Not enough room in my cord post surgery. I ended up with a pain pump. Worst decision of my life. I now have arachnoiditis, inflammation and scarring of the thin lining around the spinal cord. It’s very painful. There is no treatment and it’s progressive. People with advanced stage are generally wheelchair bound and in great agony. It’s a rare condition that can occur anytime instrumentation or even just a shot is introduced into the spinal canal. It’s becoming more frequent as spinal surgeries and procedures increase. Please discuss this complication with your doctor before proceeding.

I am so sorry to hear about your horrible complication to a pain pump. Thank you for the heads up. I will be discussing with my Dr

I had a Medtronic neurostimulator implanted in 2017 for cervical stimulation. It works very well and allowed me to stop taking muscle relaxers

@vincescs

Thank you for the response.

I had a NEVRO spinal cord stimulator implanted to help with my lumbar spine stenosis and leg pain 8 months ago. It has reduced my pain 50%.
You’ll have an external weeks trial first, to see how it helps with your pain, before permanent implant.
The follow up care and 24/7 phone care is amazing .

Thank you. I am happy to hear follow up care is good. Glad it is helping you

I had big c2 x thoracic spine over 20 years ago. I was getting the shots every fix week or the pain clinic cut off my prescriptions. Shots did not help at all. They tried to sell an implant for the pain, I was concerned about my body rejecting ,, so I asked more question, only to learn the rep had no medical knowledge at all, He was the salesman to get Medicare to pay for it.It had too many unknowns for my situation. Try told me I would need narcotics and muscle relaxers the rest of my life and I was about 40.Started me on OxyContin and soma. I have stomach issues that preclude NSAIDS. I had no problem with the OxyContin, but when it was deemed to addict-able., my primary care doctor switched me to morphine ER and Hydrocodone/apap. It did not really help much and the hassle of refills and the stigma, was just too much. I am now after over 20 years, using biofreeze, and carisoprodol for the ever present muscle spasm in shoulders and upper back. It can be taken a long time without side effects if you space your doses . appropriately . It does not impact liver. And if you need the rest of your life I do not see how that differs from insulin. I gave up the morphine and hydroxide 25 months ago. Taped off in two weeks without a hitch, but my brain does not get that serotonin reward when I take stuff like that, so I never craved any of it. Weird brain but good for my situation. I use biofreeze spray because I cannot reach my back to rub topicals on, tried a regular stem unit, but can not put it on my own back. Even with a physical therapist placing, it would pull my shoulder up off the table in spasm. Now I self pay for my carisoprodol since I turned 65 and my insurance will not approve it. I have been taking it over twenty years, never miss a pill count, or blood test vie back wrong. But it is $25 dollars a month and without it I can not function at all, it taken off too long in a hospital mixup, I got such a spasm at the top of the fusion, I became completely paralyzed from the neck down for five dsys. This was in 2021, and there was a mixup and they cold turkeyed my from narcotics and carisoprodol. I did not know my own name for days, I guess I was delusional from sudden stop of Morphine ER and Hydrocodone/apap I was on 10/ 325mg And no Carisoprodol. I could not swallow on my own so they were giving my meds busy iv It never occurred to me they had stopped all of my controlled substances. I did not crave them and I had no feeling below my neck, Do not take tzidine, it causes liver damage and is only to be used for short time frames not chronic. It is not flexeril. I was a drug research chemist before my accident. You will do better without the constipation, or other problems if you can find another way to ease it up. I am not saying an outside of your body will not work for you. Have your physical try to place it. Only drawback if you have no ody at home to reattach when you shower, you can not reach it. Another trick for that deep upper under your scapula pain is this. It is too deep and blocked by too much bone for lifo sine patches to work. Even biofreeze that smells awful, will not get those spots. Get a firm rubber ball, bigger than a tennis ball with more give. Stand against them wall and drop it carefully behind you, use your own body weight, to be sure you hit those pressure points. Press back as hard as you can posistioning the ball over your pain spot which is a knot of muscle under your shoulder blades. Press against the ball in five minute periods, less if too painful. It will release the muscle spasms and give you relief.! Good luck. You do have to give up some things that trigger it. But be careful once you stop doing regaining that functions very difficult. Spoken from a 23 year survivor.