sciatic nerve or sarcoidosis

[iwofndadvocates.com/blog]

I know from personal experience that your injury is a very serious injury and should be attended to very quickly. The numbness is possible nerve damage and must be fixed. Do not let workers compensation in your state dance around the issue of surgery to long, as the longer you wait the more damage this may cause you. Also along with a long term injury like this you will feel depressed, and should seek help with that too if you start feeling that way.

We have many injured workers in the State of North Dakota that are ignored with these types of injuries, and WSI (workers compensation) in this state will spend months trying to figure out ways out of paying this type of claim, which in some cases has caused injured workers to go without surgery for the injury as long as a year and a half. North Dakota only has a two year limit for benefits, so the injured workers in this state are forced off the system even before they are able to return to work, if they can ever work again.

I hope to find more workers from North Dakota on here, and plan to visit this site often to discuss these issues. I have also started my own site for North Dakota injured workers to talk locally on a blog. you can reach us at Injured workers of North Dakota Advocates Please feel free to blog there too, and help injured workers from other states understand what your going through too.

Injured workers no matter what state they are from need to stick together and get our right fixed so we all will recieve "Sure and Certain Relief" from Workers Compensation.

[iwofndadvocates.com/blog]

If you are getting numbness in your feet you have a nerve seriously pinched, and should be a candidate for surgery. This is not a matter for the attitude of doctors to say "lets just wait and see what happens". Untreated you could have nerve damage for the rest of your life.

[jstadfrntpn]

bagpussinamerica Wrote:jstadfrntpn,

I am curious about your pain following surgery. Is that the reason you will be having a fusion done? I had the same type of surgery as you and now find I have severe....and I mean severe, pain throughout the entire left leg and part of the right. I didn't have pain like this prior to the surgery....it feels different. And it is also affecting being able to walk or sit comfortably. I know that my nerve was severly compressed and also had a dural opening when they opened me up for surgery. But I certainly wasn't expecting this. What is yours like?

Bangbang, my surgery was 5 months after the accident, and I am still getting pain, so I hate to think what kind of compression you have to that nerve after two years. Did you say if you had an MRI done to see just what damage has been done?

my reason for having the surgery is that i am reherniated and the nerve is again compressed, its quite painful. I have been on narcotics since december, since that time i had a dr (ortho)who had a very poor bed side manner, and a bad attitude. this dr scheduled me for sept16, but lastweek i got the ball rolling to get a dr(ortho/neuro) that i feel comfortable with, who can talk to me like a human being.so now i have to wait even longer. with the discectomy i was feeling nerve pain even before i left the hospital. and over the next week or 2 i went back to the old dr complaining of painm, the pain i had before plus a different pain,(Jstadfrntpn--just a different pain)
it is sad that we go through these procedures only to come out with additional pain. from what i hear the surgery is my only option is to return to work, which i absolutely am not physically capable of, even with the meds it can't happen.surely there is nerve damage, with wc and all their waiting periods its only time to get worse. I think there is a nerve test to check what damage is done, however the mri showed swelling in the nerve

[bagpussinamerica]

Did they do an MRI with contrast? I am told that that shows up more than a regular MRI. That is what I had done last week, but don't get my results until tomorrow. I keep expecting the pain to go away, that maybe I am making it out to be worse than it is....but it is bloody worse. And it doesn't go away. All I take for it at the moment is tylenol, advil and Robaxin. That doesn't work....and I certainly can't take the Robaxin if I go to work. The pretty much just knocks me silly.

I know about hoping that the surgery would make things better. I knew I would have some small amount of pain, and some disability.....but not this much. This surely isn't a normal reaction to a discectomy. I am pretty sure that the surgeon will recind the MMI as well. I am not a nice person to be around when I have this kind of pain. Even my cats and dogs stear clear of me now.

[bangbang]

Cycler Wrote:Bagpuss.....

re: new severe post op pain in both legs

what has the post op MRI, with contrast I assume, shown is going on if anything ?

BAng Bang: a second opinion at a tertiary ( read University) Spine center is in order due to the complicating factor of the sarcoidosis. Remember that surgeons are just that, and no very little about anything else. It would seem prudent to consult a neurologist for EMG/NEV etc who works in concert with a Spine team and that going to be a at pretty sophisticated center.

Do you know any tertiary spine center in northern california that takes worker comp and if they don't how much do you think it would cost because I don't have any health insurance at all except worker comp? thanks

[jstadfrntpn]

bagpussinamerica Wrote:Did they do an MRI with contrast? I am told that that shows up more than a regular MRI. That is what I had done last week, but don't get my results until tomorrow. I keep expecting the pain to go away, that maybe I am making it out to be worse than it is....but it is bloody worse. And it doesn't go away. All I take for it at the moment is tylenol, advil and Robaxin. That doesn't work....and I certainly can't take the Robaxin if I go to work. The pretty much just knocks me silly.

I know about hoping that the surgery would make things better. I knew I would have some small amount of pain, and some disability.....but not this much. This surely isn't a normal reaction to a discectomy. I am pretty sure that the surgeon will recind the MMI as well. I am not a nice person to be around when I have this kind of pain. Even my cats and dogs stear clear of me now.

Bagpussinamerica,
after you have had back surgery they have to do the mri in contrast, so yes that is what i had too. by the time you get this reply you will have had your results. I am afraid you are saying exactly the things i said, you were expecting less pain not more. Unfortunately they don't explain the chances of reherniation to us at the time of the discectomy. now that i have had failed back surgery,I know that the disc is the middle (polposus nucleus) and you have the outer protective. when you herniate the outer protective is no longer able to keep the nucleus in the middle, and certainly when they perform discectomy, it is clipping the disc, not fixing it to where the nucleus is back in the middle of the outer protective. Its easy to reherniate again, in my case i believe it happened the day of the surgery, or less than 2 weeks after. if that is what has happened to you ask your dr. what are your options, if you dont want to have surgery again.

[bagpussinamerica]

Bang, Bang,
I do not know of any clinics in Northern California. Try searching the web for that, or possibly ask your surgeon....or a surgeons office. Did you say that you have a lawyer? You could ask them to search that information out for you. They might as well earn their money.

Jstadfrntpn,

I had my results today. At first the surgeon told me that the MRI didn't show any re herniation, but that my symptoms were classic for reherniation. Then he examined me and went back to his office to look again at his records. It was then that he found the newst MRI....apparently he didn't actually order it himself...his assistant did that, so he didn't know it was there. He looked at that and sure enough....big bulge, same site. And it goes right back to the time the the MMI doctor signed me off as being fit and having reached MMI. My surgeon told me that he would consider doing a microdiscectomy coming in at a lower angle this time, since I have scare tissue, and other issues going on there. He is not happy about doing another surgery since the first one was so odd in itself. He even asked other surgeons about the situation and they agreed that it was certainly an odd case. And with the dural opening and the leak, that made the whole thing worse overall.

I have posted here and had at least one person suggest that a fusion would be best. I am thinking it might be, since I really don't want to take the chance of another herniationon the same site with another surgery. I am really worried about the whole thing.