Have you been to a pain management clinic? Or has your doc been the one giving you these injections? If you haven't been to pain management, I would suggest getting a referral to one. There, they can give you more options for pain & relief.

If you HAVE been to pain management, then ask your doc for a referral to a Neurosurgeon ~ you need one who SPECIALIZES in CERVICAL SPINES. You do NOT want a NEUROLOGIST but a NEUROSURGEON. You at least need an opinion.

I do not advocate surgery, as surgery just begets more surgery. Surgery should be a LAST RESORT, when all other options have failed. And surgery should not be performed with the hopes of relieving pain. Most of the time you have the same pain or worse after surgery. Surgery only corrects mechanical problems. It does NOT relieve pain. If you happen to get relief, you got a bonus.

Also, when you have surgery, the levels above and below the surgical site tend to fail because they have to take on an additional load. So a year or more after surgery, you're back in the operating room. This happens all the time. That's why I say surgery begets surgery. Also, with fusions you have the added problem of instrumentation failure - some loosen and/or break and you end up having to have more surgery to repair the instrumentation. There is always the chance of failure to fuse ~ this is common.

I've had 2 open surgeries - this was before the microsurgery that they do now. I'm worse now than I was before surgery. In fact I'm disabled now due to the surgeries, and I've had severe sciatica for 25 years. It's been hell. So I would seriously think about surgery before jumping into it. I'm not a rare case - I'm one of millions of Americans who have had surgery who probably shouldn't have. God bless, and take care. Hugs, Lee