L4-5 disc bulge & L5-S1 moderate paracentral disc extrusion

[Greg]

Welcome to the forum cmak! I was wondering, is the Spinal Axial Decompression you did where you lay on a table, they strap you up to the machine and kind of stretch your spine in short segments repeatedly? I did a spinal decompresion on the DX-9000 and my situation was too far gone for too long, at least that's my theory. You said you got some releif? I'm glad that your being so proactive early on, that's the best chance for a full recovery while avoiding the biggest surgeries. I wish the doctors would have believed me about my back pain 8 years ago and I could have been in your situation.

There's some great advice here. I'm glad you decided to join our community. Best of luck to you and remember, there are no dumb questions. The only dumb questions are the ones you didn't ask!

Take care!

[Keano16]

Justin,
Thanks for your advice. After looking through your domestic travels postings, I found that California consists of mostly surgeons who practice standard/traditional surgery with extremely high tech equipment such as UCSD, but none that do the PLDD procedure. Google searches only give me those "laser" centers which look incredibly unreliable. Correct me if I'm wrong. Also, much respect to you for founding such a great forum :thumpup:. Thanks

Hi, as I told you already, doctor Choy is wonderful doctor and a person. My friend spinal neurosurgeon was educated by him and he also rates him highly.

Lets just repeat already mentioned things... Dr. Choy with Peter Ascher founded PLDD in Austria 25 years ago. During years it was spread worldwide among experienced spinal surgeons as first line treatments for contained disc herniations.

With years of application of laser for contained disc herniation, some surgeons started to "experiment" and found great results with PLDD for extruded (non-contained) herniations, cervical herniations, discogenic pain (internal disc disruption/degenerative disc disease).

In my opinion, Accurascope is incomparable to PLDD due to several things:
- PLDD is well known and spread worldwide for 25 years
- Accurascope does not have ANY scientific articles published about its application or results
- Accurascope utilizes Th:Yag laser energery that is know only to North American Spine
- PLDD utilize Nd:Yag laser energergy that is scientifically proved safe and effective with intradiscal application

[Gilbert P]

You have been given some great advice, Research

Keano was correct Accurascope is something I was going to try NOT NOW

We are here to help and learn

All The Best

Gil

[cmak]

Welcome to the forum cmak! I was wondering, is the Spinal Axial Decompression you did where you lay on a table, they strap you up to the machine and kind of stretch your spine in short segments repeatedly? I did a spinal decompresion on the DX-9000 and my situation was too far gone for too long, at least that's my theory. You said you got some releif? I'm glad that your being so proactive early on, that's the best chance for a full recovery while avoiding the biggest surgeries. I wish the doctors would have believed me about my back pain 8 years ago and I could have been in your situation.

There's some great advice here. I'm glad you decided to join our community. Best of luck to you and remember, there are no dumb questions. The only dumb questions are the ones you didn't ask!

Take care!

Greg,
We both did the same procedure, just different machines. It did get me from about 20-30% health back to 70% or so. Not for everyone, but with the right symptoms/problems its very effective. If u can or willing to give it a try, the Vax-D machines are medically tested and pioneered the Axial Spinal Decompression technique. The treatment center I've been going to had the machines personally installed by the founder Dr. Allen Dyer, former Deputy Ministry of Health aka Canadian Surgeon General. He created it because he and his wife started back problems themselves.

Anyways, thanks all for the warm welcome!

[Greg]

Greg,
We both did the same procedure, just different machines. It did get me from about 20-30% health back to 70% or so. Not for everyone, but with the right symptoms/problems its very effective. If u can or willing to give it a try, the Vax-D machines are medically tested and pioneered the Axial Spinal Decompression technique. The treatment center I've been going to had the machines personally installed by the founder Dr. Allen Dyer, former Deputy Ministry of Health aka Canadian Surgeon General. He created it because he and his wife started back problems themselves.

Anyways, thanks all for the warm welcome!

cmak,

Wow....sounds like you were in the right hands. I was about 95% sure we both had the same thing done but with different machines but since your procedure was called AXIAL Spinal Decompression and mine didn't have the axial in the name thats what made me thought maybe its a different way or method of decompression. By the 8th session my constant pain (not the flare ups) had dropped by about 20%....maybe 30 on a good day. I did 24 sessions in total but didnt get any greater results. My boss/landlord/lifelong friend/childhood mentor has had back issues forever and he was the one to do this and recommend it to me. He said his research showed that 8 sessions is the magic number and you wouldn't see much more relief with doing more sessions. That was the case for him and the same for me. But we all know how the mind works and if we think it wont work past a certain point than thats what our mind will let us feel.

I think it is a great tool and excellent conservative treatment for certain conditions but my thoughts on it is it's kind of like going to a chiropractor. If you get treated in the beginning when you first start to have symptons then you would probably achieve maximum results. I did get some relief from it but an 8 year old degenerative herniated disk can only get so much better from the decompression. I even added my own treatment to go along with it. I took some supplements that were all aimed at reviving cells and rehydrating my discs. And I used a nebulizer to inhale pentosan sulfate which was developed to treat arthritis and it stimulates re-growth of new cartilage in the joint! So we took the idea of what it was designed to do and apply it to attempt to rehydrate/grow/repair the degenerative discs. I have to say between the decompression, supplements and pentosan sulfate I did get some relief. I just wish I had known about this 8 years ago and I probably wouldn't have just had a 2 level ALIF. Here is a link to an article on Pentosan Sulfate. It is also used to relieve pain or discomfort associated with chronic inflammation of the bladder.
Arthritis Treatment Without The Side Effects: Pentosan Sulfate

My friend who did the 8 treatments with the all the extras I mentioned is almost completely healed after having issues for 20 years (50 year old male). He was on 800mg of celebrex a day but takes nothing now He uses the inversion table everyday along with the right stretches and PT to keep a good preventative maintenance program going and its amazing how it turned him around. I hope more people can benefit from this treatment.

[cmak]

Hey all. Just wanted to give u guys an update. Just like new forum member Dan, I went to Dr Choy in NYC and got the PLDD procedure. Just like him I'm going through the post op uneasiness but feel much better overall. Thanks for ur support. If anybody is considering surgery I would HIGHLY recommend at least consulting with him before doing open surgery.

[Keano16]

Unfortunately he is retiring by the end of this year...

[KanRunMo]

I did the decompression machine (DX-9000) or something like that name. It did help but I think it's one of those things that you have to keep doing. I thought they way over charged even though my insurance paid a lot of it. At the same time as the machine, they also do physical therapy, electrical charges to the back, ice and heat machine and give you a massage. It's a little hard to tell what actually helped. I do have an inversion table and it does help but I can't seem to make myself do it very often. All these things are relieving the pain symptoms to an extent but are not "curing" the back problems. The back continues to degerate or slip off kilter. After you do research, I'm kind of with KBear, that maybe getting surgery before the symptoms get so bad, might be better. It's all a gamble but the odds have gotten better in the last few years. Aqua exercise in deep water seems to be helping me as well as walking (my big dog). I quit running and doing impact aerobics just because I visualized it pounding my discs further down. I still play some tennis (slow doubles) and some golf. Golf seems to be the hardest on my back but I won't give it up yet.