Stenum Hospital -- New Press Release: First to Offer M6 Artificial Lumbar Disc Replacement Surgery

[Terry Newton]

katie:

Would Stenum be approved by the Canadian system for this surgery? Would the limited metal in the disc still be a problem for you?

So many questions; so little time.

[Katie]

Terry, I'm back at square one with this. I will need to go back to the Appeal Board to get approval for funding, just as I was working on for the Maverick at Stenum. I've been working on that appeal for a year and a half, and put it aside just a little while ago when I thought the surgeon here was able to do it instead.

Now I have to try and convince them that this is what I need, especially since this specific device is not available here. The provincial insurance had denied my application for out of country funding because I could not get an Ontario doctor to say I needed this surgery.

Funny, I have no problem getting Dr. Bitan and several others, plus the newest surgeon from another province to say that I was urgent. But the last Ontario surgeon said all I had was carpal tunnel, that my cervical levels were not a problem at all. But he didn't do any of the testing that Dr. Bitan and others did, the Hoffman test and hyperreflexion etc.

I have to get all the paperwork together again, and see if my current surgeon will support my appeal, as I don't see a way that he can do the surgery here when it isn't approved.

I checked both with the manufacturer and the lab that did the allergy testing, and both thought that I should have no problem with this disc. Titanium is the only metal I am not highly sensitive to. This disc only contains 4% of one other metal that bothers me, mixed in with Titanium, and then the whole metal part of the appliance is again covered in 100% Titanium.

The lab said that titanium is so strong that it won't even break down into ions like all the other metals, only particles, that with that strength, it should not wear down and allow any of the other metal alloy to leach into my system.

They make a lot of knee replacement components for people who are allergic to other metals like I am. I still haven't heard anything from Stenum regarding my last questions to them.