Multilevel cervical degenerative disc disease: How's surgery?

@cyp238ress Having a steroid spinal injection that helps take away pain is telling you that surgery may be able to fix that pain. It reduces inflammation and buys a little bit of space for your nerves and/or spinal cord. If either bone or a ruptured disc are compressing nerves or the spinal cord, it can generate pain or weakness. When a disc bulges, it disperses weight unevenly, and that can cause bone to change. Uneven pressure on the end plates of the vertebrae cause bone to remodel, thicken or form bone spurs. A ruptured disc that has spilled out the jelly like nucleus causes inflammation and stimulates growth of bone spurs. That is arthritis of the spine.

During spine surgery, a surgeon will reshape bone as needed. They remove bones spurs and enlarge the spaces in the foramen at the nerve roots. They need to prepare the surface for what they are implanting. With fusion, that is s flat surface of a bone disc or cage, and with artificial disks or implants that slide in, it may be a groove that is cut to match the shape of the implant.
A normal EMG is a good thing and tells you that your nerves are working. If the EMG was abnormal, it may be indicating a problem with your peripheral nerves and your doctors will start looking for a different problem.

My neck was pretty noisy before my spine surgery. I had a ruptured C5/C6 that had been bulging for years, and I think it was the disk rubbing on the bone of adjacent vertebrae causing the noise. By the time I had surgery, the disc height had collapsed by 50%. Sometimes noise like clicking comes from facet joints. As a disc collapses, more weight shifts onto the facets and they wear out. Normally 80% of body weight is supported by discs, and 20 % on the facet joints.

Spine issues do cause muscle spasms, and it is common to lose the lordotic curve in the neck as the cervical spine becomes straight. Sometimes it can bend forward (kyphosis). I had lots of muscle spasms before my spine surgery and my physical therapist was treating these and pain with electrical stimulation at the nerve roots. After the surgery that freed my spinal cord from compression, the muscle spasms really calmed down. They had been bad enough to independently rotate my C1 & C2 vertebrae and that caused vertigo.

If you have spinal cord compression in your neck and no other spine issues in the rest of your body, it may cause foot and sciatic pain and numbness in limbs.

With your question about the lordotic curve in ADR vs fusion, a fusion tends to be a straight join that dumps the spine forward a bit. The ADR can allow movement and may allow a more normal curve. That is a question for the surgeon, and specific to the implant. It all depends on how many levels need surgery. if you have a single level that needs a fusion as I did, that doesn't affect my curvature very much and my range of motion is about the same as before surgery.

Keep on learning about your condition and consult as many opinions as you need to make an informed choice. Your story is similar to many spine patients with cervical issues. Find the best surgeon that you can. I had a great result from my surgery, and it changed my life for the better. We are all different with different issues and other health issues that may possibly affect our ability to heal and recover. Learn about all the risks of any procedure and balance that against the benefit you can achieve. Ask questions and advocate for yourself.

Hi, I’m a 42yr female in Australia, i had ADCF C6/7 done almost 2 years ago, after injuring myself a work 3 years ago.
My pain was like a deep aching burn feeling with muscle spasms and numbness it starting behind my shoulder and ran down my entire arm into my thumb and 1st 2 fingers, I never had neck pain!!

Dr intially thought I had shoulder bursitis, I had 2 cortisone injections 3 months apart in the right shoulder, did physio 3 times a week until finally about 7 months later I seen a neurosurgeon, mri showed degenerative disc disease, significant foraminal stenosis at c5/6 and c6/7 with bone spurs and cord impingement at both levels
I had epidural injections in both C6 and C7 nerve roots which only made things worse, this is when the neck pain well and truely kicked In and I started losing range of motion when turning my head, was like my head was too heavy to hold
I continued physio for another 3 months with no improvement, this is when my neurosurgeon decided to put me under the knife.

Waking from surgery, I complained of stronger neck and arm pain and a burning buzzing feeling in the right side of my face running down into my right leg and foot, it was brushed off like it was all in my head.
3 months post surgery, I was in more pain, I was also suffering from colour and temperature fluctuations in my right arm/hand, I had an EMG results came back normal but the neurologist immediately referred me to pain management as he suspected I had complex regional pain syndrome.
The pain specialist and neurologist both agreed and diagnosed me with right upper quadrant CRPS 3 months post surgery.
the following 6 months, things only worsened again with pain and loss of function in my right leg/foot which by this stage the leg and foot were also suffering from colour and temperature fluctuations.
One year post surgery, multiple different neurosurgeon visits, I was told my surgery was successful regardless of the ongoing pain and loss of function, I was then diagnosed with right sided ipsilateral CRPS.
I feel as though someone has drawn a line down the centre of my body and everything on the right has this painful burning pressure, my limbs burn to the point they feel frostbiten, I struggle daily with mobility issues as I can no longer put full pressure on my right leg, I have lost almost all strength in my right arm and hand, even holding a pen is an issue.

January this year I had a week long ketamine infusion and a lumbar punch to check for any autoimmune component, no improvement, but the new EMG showed denervation of C6 and C7
Over the last 6 months, I have had multiple nerve blocks, both cervical and lumbar which once again only flared things up.

The way the last neurosurgeon explained things to me, the longer a nerve is impinged more chance of permanent damage, sort of like having furniture on carpet, leave it there too long and even though you move it the imprint stays…

My pain specialist and neurosurgeon now want to implant 2 separate spinal cord stimulators, one in cervical and the other in thoracic spine, I go for the trial in 2 weeks, petrified is an understatement!

My advice, tackle this head on, advocate for yourself, get multiple opinions and go in hard and fast.
I suffered with arm pain for 12mths before drs finally decided to operate, now all I do is wonder if they acted faster would I still be in this position or would I have my life back

Hopefully you sort something out and start feeling better soon xx