Male scheduled for my 3rd epidural with steroids next week for on-going spinal stenosis, relieves pain for a few days, then back to pain.<p>Will go for minimally invasive micro laminectomy next, tired of treating symptoms and not the root cause.<p>In that procedure surgeon will remove parts of lower vertebrae that is pinching the nerve bundle, nerves that progress down each leg.<p>Success rates of better than 70%, it's a gamble. But willing to accept that rather than end up on addictive pain pills for life.<p>3 to 6 months recovery period before active lifestyle again, cannot risk disturbing the "fix". Giving up flip turns in lap swimming for quite a while. Supplemental covers the other 20% that medicare won't pay.<p>Cash paying patients suffer $35k to $45 K for the procedure.<p>Medicare pony's up only about $6,500, which the surgeon must accept, no extra cash changes hands.<p>Supplemental covers the 20% that medicare will not pay.
I understand everyone has different beliefs, and personally, I fall extremely short of what I should be, but I just took some time to pray for you and your procedure. I really hope the root cause is fully resolved.
My mother had this surgery and advised me to never have it done due to complications
(While it's clear you've done a ton of your own research for your own case.)<p>Steve Kerr's advice after his own back surgery complications (albeit microdiscectomy, not a laminectomy) make me hesitant:<p>"If you're listening out there, if you have a back problem, stay away from surgery... Rehab, rehab, rehab. Don't let anybody get in there."
I helped a friend through a microdiscectomy, and it could not have gone better. Laparoscopic procedure, short recovery, lifechanging reduction in symptoms. The biggest hurdle was that their insurance required PT/rehab prior to authorization, even though all the experts involved agreed that it would not help.
This kind of comment is only marginally better than "well, I asked ChatGPT and...."<p>You acknowledge the parent commenter knows more than you, but you decide it's somehow helpful to post contradictory information anyway sourced from someone else who also likely knows more than you.
Honestly surgeons should be paid hourly like technicians. $800/hr or something like that. For a 2 hour procedure, $1600. Another $5k for facility and support staff. Looks like medicare is on point...
I'm with you until I remember how expensive medical school plus internship is in the US. If doctors cannot pay back their student loans, it doesn't matter. The majority of folks in medical school have family that can support them now - not fixing education will make this even worse.<p>Don't get me wrong. I support state-sponsored health care, especially after moving from the US to Norway over a decade ago. Just the peace of mind not having to worry so much about financial ruin because of health issues relieves so much stress - even stress related to just keeping yourself healthy is less (If I get hurt while jogging, it isn't a big issue, for example) But fixing the US system is bigger than just payments or insurance for all. Gotta fix things like education costs, the burden of unpaid internships, and things like that, too. I wish it weren't such a complicated problem and I wish there were the political desire to do such a thing.
Medicare for all fixes a lot of the problems with the US health system!
Go for surgery if you have neurological symptoms (loss of sensation, motor function, etc). If its pain, try your best to avoid surgery and find the right physiotherapist to help you be pain free. Spine surgery is risky and there is a risk of cascading failures.<p>Don't completely trust any anesthesiologist (pain management) or neurosurgeon (for surgery) or chiropractor or random folks advice to do yoga/stretch. Spend quite a bit of time understanding the anatomy, read up on everything and maybe you will find the right set of exercises to help relieve pain. Troubleshooting disk/spine/nerve issues is very hard and most doctors don't have any time to investigate it deeply. They just look at MRI. There are lots of people with the same problems showing up on MRI, but they are pain free.
why "not" yoga/stretch ? I understand it may not be the right thing for every kind of pain but the way it is usually presented (your body needs movement) sounds convincing. (I don't practice yoga but taichi)
I have to cautiously agree with you, with the caveat that many physios don't seem to know what they're doing either and the effectiveness of therapy can differ wildly based on which therapist and what regimen they use. Speaking as someone with a herniated disc that went through a discectomy which re-herniated immediately following surgery. Frankly I've only just now started getting relief by reducing the amount of weight pushing on the disc by way of treatment with semaglutide. Could've saved myself thousands of dollars in medical costs and rehab if I'd just done this a year ago.