Spinal Cord Stimulators (SCS)

[Cindylou]

Good Luck Dave. I hope this SCS does the magic on you. Keep us posted by and by so we can see if it is working for you.

[Justin]

Hey Dave,

I hope the three naps helped. Let's hope the half-body TENS unit does the trick!

[mark-Perth]

Hope U R starting to feel better after the implanting of the wires. I could immagine that U would be a little sore for a few days from it but hopefully its all worth the effort and reduces the pain. U wait to U see the xrays with the wires in you and then U will realise why it hurts puting it in.
I definately agree that U deserve a damn good glass of wine, especially if U havent had too many norco's. Hey Ill have one 2 to celebrate as well
All the best mate.

Mark

[daveinaustin]

Thanks everybody for your support!

We did break out a good bottle of wine! One of our favorites is called Conundrum. Although I typically like Red wines, on a hot, Texas day, I was ready for a good white wine! Mark, thanks for having "two" for me!


As you know, I had the SCS trial phase this week. After a day and half of recovering, I had half of Tuesday and all of yesterday to "kick it around," and had it removed this morning.

It reduced my pain from level 6-8 to 4-5, and cut my Norcos from 6 a day to 3 (actually just 2.5 yesterday). Therefore, it seems like a promising technology.

Initially, it was kind of a weird sensation. As mentioned, it was like a half-body TENs unit, or even, like a built-in vibrating chair.

I was able to reduce the voltage when I rested, and would turn it off in the middle of the night. After two days, was used to the half-body sensation.

Once the leads were pulled, it only took about 30-60 minutes for me to start missing it. I'm back up to my normal Norco level, and have been resting in bed today.


I would still prefer to determine and solve the root cause. However, the SCS is a good "fall back plan" if the others don't pan out. I'm still researching the following areas:

• Intraoperative nerve testing,
• Nerve conduction velocity testing, and
• Radio frequency denervation of the Ramus Communicans Nerve.

There's some hope for the RF denervation; however, my pain management doctor stated the dorsal rami is not as apparent to find after having L4-S1 ALIF fusions than beforehand. If anybody has any research on this matter, please let me know.

-Dave