Re: Severe back/leg pain continuing--advice?
- From: "OldGoat" <oldgoatmail@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 02 Apr 2007 02:17:53 GMT
Dear Mel,
I should have told you we may start out slow, but we go after somebody like
gangbusters, especially if we feel like we missed you the first time.
You need a neurological work up, man. That "feeling like a funnybone" is a
dead give away. Forget the orthopedics. A lot of people may find it
different, but don't blow off nerve blocks and epidurals and other such
injections. The funny bone thing is a nerve plexus (like the wind robbing
solar plexus) which they just might be able to do something with. See either
a neurosurgeon or an anesthesiologist that does pain control about getting
those. Try at least 3 if you don't find them terribly sucky(my wife would be
smacking me in the head if she knew I used "sucky" in a note to a college
professor. With my luck English or some literary specialty, to top it off).
But the block can help with leg pain, as well as a TENS unit, which is like
a little walkman sized electrical massage machine.That really simplifying
the actions, but the idea is to block the pain buzz going to the brain with
it's little buzz of electric current. The back pain is the worst for me and
its been damn near impossible to find real cure for even surgically, but
those couple things (injections were so/so,depending on what they were
working on, but you can't go wrong getting a TENS unit, you will find it
works well on many things) can really reduce the radiating leg pain. I have
found ways to reduce that (fallen asleep more than once with a tennis ball
under my ass) and hopefully you will too.
One thing I want to slide in here. I know you said Advil or Motrin (both
ibuprophen),tylenol or acetaminophen and Flexeril was the routine in the
past. You may end up changing that routine medicinally. Beware of Tylenol
and Advil types of drugs. Both of them, nearly every OTC pain reliever, and
many prescription drugs belong to a family known as NSAIDs
(Non-steroidal-anti-inflammatory drugs. Now you know why they call them
NSAID's.). This family of drugs is responsible for more deaths every year
than all the narcotics combined. It shows up as liver or kidney failure in
most cases and is just generally bad news for your GI tract. Acetaminophen
daily max is 4000mgs. Ibuprophen is 2400mgs per day. it gets lower from
there for all of them, even the Rx ones. Doctors don't even know what
they're doing with NSAID's, they exceed daily max doses, will prescribe
multiple medications full of the same NSAID, and keep them on a patient much
longer than is safe, in Tylenol's case 10 days. Any Rx you get that says
APAP on it is tylenol mixed with something. You have to watch yourself, but
you have to watch the doctors too.
Now for my disclaimer: I'm warning you that I believe very strongly in pain
drugs for treating pain. That means a pro narcotics bias. It shows up a lot
when I write in here. But I can always back up the talk with documentation.
So even if it sounds like I'm promoting better living through chemistry(and
I am for those with pain issues that nothing else has helped), I speak what
I know and know what I speak. I don't believe in BS, which a few doctors
have found out by trying to tell me tall tales of the DEA. A display of
frustration is not always out of line when the exam room door is shut.
Sometimes you need to make some noise to get adequate pain control.
Hopefully you wont need any of the stuff in this post and you'll find this
was just an extended bout of a little sciatica, and a couple more weeks of
PT and heat, the weather breaking and the return of spring will bring an end
this issue. But if you end up getting more invasive than a fresh MRI, we're
open all hours, so make yourself at home.
Hope U R up and running again soon--og
"MZB" <moo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:BqyPh.68$fQ1.32@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I posted the message below but I only got one response (thanks Old Goat).
He indicated that others have similar problems. I'm hoping some will
respond. I don't see other newsgoups just devoted to back pain and I guess
I don't have a chronic condition yet, but I hope to get some
answers/suggestions.
In fact, let me also add:
The main problem is the leg pain. I am a college professor. I am
going in now, teaching 2 consecutive 2-hour classes (plus 1 office hour)
and
then going home and pretty much resting. This is 4 days a week. This
week,
my last workday will be Wednesday, so I will have 4 days to rest and I am
resting this weekend.
What I am finding is the back pain has improved 70%
from its most acute phase but the leg pain is worse. It is horrible.
Yesterday, it started out okay and no problems teaching my first class but
it just really deteriorated during the second class. We also had a family
get-together/birthday celebration last night. It included dinner at a
restaurant. I just did that part and went home. It just gets so fatiguing.
Should the leg pain go away as the back pain diminishes? So far, that's
not
the case at all.
I have an aversion to medications, but I do have flexeril and OTC
ibuprofin.
In the past it just seemed to mask the pain and the pain seemed to get
worse
than ever when the drugs wore off. I will have to take that again, I
guess.
Years ago, an MRI revealed I guess what you would call degenerative
disk disease. That is, the disk space was pretty much non-existent at 4 or
5
levels. But there was no leg pain and they said no evidence of stenosis or
herniation. I eventually recovered fom that episode (back pain and
spasms).
This is very different the back pain is much lower (tailbone and pelvic
area).
Anyway, I am very frustrated. I guess this is more a vent than anything,
but
if anyone has any more ideas, I'm listening. The problem is right now I
would like to "work it out" but that doesn't work as any activity makes it
worse.
So, I'm resting and I might do some simple exercises that the P/T
recommended although I am not sure she knows what she is doing. (She is
supposed to be decent but she seems so unsure of herself!). The exercises
did seem to help with the back, but then the leg pain started and that has
been the main problem. They are obviously related but it seems that even
with the back pain diminished the leg pain gets worse.
I'll stop rambling now.
My original post to this board follows:
I recently started having severe back pain after shoveling snow/ice (about
4
weeks ago).
Since Saturday, the pain has gone into my left leg -- pretty severe.
P/T seems to think it might well be nerve root pain and so far P/T is not
helping.
Question: once back pain also turns into leg pain, does this mean it won't
go away via therapy?? Am I doomed to surgery (which I probably am not a
candidate for due to degenrative disk disease at a variety of levels) or
injections or stronger stuff. Or are exerises still possible to relieve
the
back/leg pain. In the past, I've had lots of back pain problems but
usually
found the key to overcoming it (extra walking and/or exercise). I've never
had the leg pain.
A final question: is there a newsgroup dedicated to back pain??? I can't
seem to find one on my server. What about some kind of back pain forum on
the internet?
Mel
.
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