Posted: 9/3/2014 11:44:39 AM EDT
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The short of it...Has anyone had a Lumbar discogram/discography before? What can I expect, how much pain, what was your experience?
For those of you who want background, the long story, or are just so bored out of your mind by your life that you want read about mine, here's the background....(If you have a life go ahead and skip this part.) Four years ago I was a jailer at a mid-sized (200,000 citizens) city jail outside a large city (over 1 million). Our jail is large compared to other cities our size... capacity approximately 200 inmates, but typically ran around 40-50 and spiked to about 100 during the holiday shoplifting/beat -on-a-family member season. Our jailers are trained civilians, actually pretty well trained compared to other cities, not police officers. About half to two-thirds of our inmates were just normal folks sitting out time for tickets they didn't/couldn't pay off. I'm 5'10" and at the time I was a wirey-muscled 175 pounds. I'm a white male and at the time I was one of the lowest use-of-force jailers, of course heavily intoxicated/tweakers that hadn't come down was a constant issue, but I could usually talk down upset or mentally unstable inmates that were just sitting out something. I had five years experience in the jail. The post is tooo long, I'll continue the story in the thread for those of you that have no life. |
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Quoted: The short of it...Has anyone had a Lumbar discogram/discography before? What can I expect, how much pain, what was your experience? For those of you who want background, the long story, or are just so bored out of your mind by your life that you want read about mine, here's the background....(If you have a life go ahead and skip this part.) Four years ago I was a jailer at a mid-sized (200,000 citizens) city jail outside a large city (over 1 million). Our jail is large compared to other cities our size... capacity approximately 200 inmates, but typically ran around 40-50 and spiked to about 100 during the holiday shoplifting/beat -on-a-family member season. Our jailers are trained civilians, actually pretty well trained compared to other cities, not police officers. About half to two-thirds of our inmates were just normal folks sitting out time for tickets they didn't/couldn't pay off. I'm 5'10" and at the time I was a wirey-muscled 175 pounds. I'm a white male and at the time I was one of the lowest use-of-force jailers, of course heavily intoxicated/tweakers that hadn't come down was a constant issue, but I could usually talk down upset or mentally unstable inmates that were just sitting out something. I had five years experience in the jail. The post is tooo long, I'll continue the story in the thread for those of you that have no life. |
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Part 2:
This white guy in his early 20's, about my height and weight, came in for something small like shoplifting or warrants for tickets or some such. We spotted that he was throwed off pretty early on and put him in a single cell to keep an eye on him. While I was passing the cell later, I saw that he was using his long fingernails to try to scratch his face off and he was doing a pretty good job. He was already bleeding from the cheeks and was starting in on his eyes. I let the other 3-4 jailers nearby know what was going on and popped the door. I got control of one of his arms and by the time he really started trying to struggle, the next jailer got in and started trying to get hold of the other arm. Unfortunately, the rookie built like a line-backer was the next in and decided to tackle us all to the ground. We got the guy into a restraint chair and sent him off to the hospital and to the psyche ward. Of course when the adrenaline wore off, the pain hit from the fact that I hit the floor wrong. |
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There is a little pain, but the worst part is psychological.
They had me lie prone on a table and the surgeon sat on my butt. A nurse who's job was to look at my eyes during the procedure told me to keep them open. I was a little anxious and flinched at the prick of the needle which was met with an extremely stern warning from the doc. Just relax and stay still. You'll be fine. |
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When I had mine done I really didn't have a choice, it was an emergency. Pain so bad I would pass out but when you start to piss yourself they wont mess around anymore and throw you on the table. When I woke up my family said I looked like a completely different person, I wasn't in pain anymore and it showed. Going on 12 years now and its just starting to give me problems again but I haven't been nice to my back during that time. Skiing, dirtbiking, kayaking and working way too hard has kinda undone it a little.
Edit: I may have had something different done to my back, I don't know what the procedure was called but I have a large scar on my lower back. |
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I had disc surgery 20 years ago, and I'm on track to do it again on 2 other discs. The surgery from 20 years ago was compltely successful. Recent MRI's show that the disc is perfect. The ones above and below it are completely blown out and pressing heavily on both sciatic nerves. I'm way too busy to take the 4 week recovery on right now. You can expect to be bed ridden for the first two weeks. Take pain meds as instructed and the pain will be tolerable. Lay still and watch TV and fuck around on Arfcom. NO FAPPING. The third week, you will be able to be mobile, but you can't pick up ANYTHING. If you do, you WILL fuck up the discs and herniate the repair job. The pain will decrease linearly during the third and fourth week. The fourth week you can pick some thing up, but nothing heavy. This is when most people get over confident and fuck up the surgery. You can start fapping again, but make it snappy and don't overdo it. After 4 weeks, you can go back to work, but take it very easy for a few weeks. No bending over and picking up heavy shit. The moderate pain will peter out after 6-8 weeks. Stop taking the narcotic pain meds as quickly as possible and go to Advil or Tylenol. If they do it right, you'll be right as rain.
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Yup Lurch, the city is covering the medical costs.
Part 3: Four years of therapy, anti-inflamatories, and facet injections later...as time has gone by the back pain has increased, I've lost feeling in my lower right leg and foot, and I have shooting pain through the right hip and into the right thigh. The facet injections have stopped working and the pain management doc sent me to a surgeon and to get a new MRI. Well, this doc's office worker hands us a disc copy of the MRI and tells:-)us that we might want a second opinion before we even go in to see the surgeon and have him tell us about the Mri results! He tells me that the symptoms don't match where the herniated discs he's seeing on the MRI. He recommends I go back for more facet injections (which have stopped working), therapy (I use a walker to stand at this point since I effectively have one leg to stand on), and maybe see a shrink. I arrange to see another doctor. |
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Thanks for the replies. This dye discography/discogram is the prep for the surgery, basically verifying the new doc's call that it needs surgery.
Continuing the story...Part 3: I saw a new surgeon, went ahead and came off the anti-inflamatories and the hydrocodone about a week before the appointment so he could see what i was really feeling. I had a worker's comp nurse come to the appointment with me. I also happened to have a bad case of allergies that day. Every time I sneezed the pain shot from my constant 7 up to and straight through a 10! We are talking squirm on the floor and scream in pain with every sneeze. This surgeon pulled up the MRI on the computer in front of us (me, my wife, and the nurse), and points out the L5 and L6 are compressed, dessicated, and have hernias approximately 4mm pressing on the nerves that go down my right leg. So he wants to do a dye discography to verify I need disc fusion surgery. |
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Quoted:
There is a little pain, but the worst part is psychological. They had me lie prone on a table and the surgeon sat on my butt. A nurse who's job was to look at my eyes during the procedure told me to keep them open. I was a little anxious and flinched at the prick of the needle which was met with an extremely stern warning from the doc. Just relax and stay still. You'll be fine. They say that I'll have a light anesthetic and as they inject the dye, it will stimulate the pain I'm feeling in my back and leg. I'm concerned about if the pain hits a 10 I won't be able to hold still. Afterwards I have another MRI focused on the discs with dye in them. |
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Quoted:
Thanks for the replies. This dye discography/discogram is the prep for the surgery, basically verifying the new doc's call that it needs surgery. Continuing the story...Part 3: I saw a new surgeon, went ahead and came off the anti-inflamatories and the hydrocodone about a week before the appointment so he could see what i was really feeling. I had a worker's comp nurse come to the appointment with me. I also happened to have a bad case of allergies that day. Every time I sneezed the pain shot from my constant 7 up to and straight through a 10! We are talking squirm on the floor and scream in pain with every sneeze. This surgeon pulled up the MRI on the computer in front of us (me, my wife, and the nurse), and points out the L5 and L6 are compressed, dessicated, and have hernias approximately 4mm pressing on the nerves that go down my right leg. So he wants to do a dye discography to verify I need disc fusion surgery. There's your problem, you've got an extra! |
| I was all worked up and worried prior to my discogram. Once they gave me the sedative, I did not care what they did to me. The doc injected 4 discs, 3 of them were ruptured. When he injected the dye, the 3 torn discs duplicated my pain symptoms exactly. The pain after the dye was injected lasted just a few seconds. I was in la la land and the discogram was a breeze. The anticipation is much worse than the actual procedure. |
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Quoted:
I was all worked up and worried prior to my discogram. Once they gave me the sedative, I did not care what they did to me. The doc injected 4 discs, 3 of them were ruptured. When he injected the dye, the 3 torn discs duplicated my pain symptoms exactly. The pain after the dye was injected lasted just a few seconds. I was in la la land and the discogram was a breeze. The anticipation is much worse than the actual procedure. Thanks tracker. I'll be able to hold it through a few seconds of the pain being intense. Follow up to the story...since I wouldn't be reliable in a use of force situation, I transferred to be a 911 call taker a few months after the injury. |
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Quoted:
People still do discograms? I do spine surgery for a living and I've never done one, seen one, and don't even really know how to interpret one. I don't know anyone who routinely orders them. I hear they aren't pleasant but are not awful to go through. Curious if you just go based on the MRI then? My workers comp nurse that was with us seemed to see it as a rational step towards the surgery. I believe I used the proper term for my understanding of what the described to me; dye discogram or dye discography. From what I read the terms seemed interchangeable to me. As a spine surgeon, I would love to hear anything you have to say on the subject. I'm looking at having the dye discogram on my lowest two lumbar discs that are damaged and my surgeon said he would do the dye discogram on the disc above them to read it as a baseline. He said he does not believe their is any leakage of the fluid inside the discs, but the dye will verify that. It will be immediately followed by a new MRI and, based on my current MRI, he expects the results to verify his call that a fusion surgery is necessary. Do you think he is just being cautious? Maybe my last MRI just isn't definitive enough? I honestly don't think he is just trying to pad the bill, because when he first mentioned that he wanted to do it he really didn't expect my workers comp nurse to say they would approve it. |