Originally Posted by aj822

Surgery and RSD... be super careful!!

You sound similar to my case – Initial injury torn meniscus. I have had 3 surgeries to repair knee (2 of which were major OATES procedures) over past 4 years and my Ortho did not realize that my constant complaints of pain was RSD. He swears that if he had known/realized that RSD was present he would not have performed surgery 2 or 3! I now know that I had RSD symptoms way back to when I first fell and hurt my knee but no one diagnosed it for over 2.5years. My knee never healed and I have 9 cm of meniscus missing which makes walking very painful but NO ONE will touch me to operate on my knee because my RSD is so bad.

Now this past December my Pain Doctor surgically implanted a spinal stimulator and he told me the odds of RSD spreading to the incision areas as well as the hardware/wire areas were slim but possible. He down played the risk I believe because he saw dollar signs associated with implant. I know that sounds cynical but now that the implanted stimulator is not really helping he is no longer excited and engaged in my care. I took the chance and gambled because I felt the benefits of the stimulator were greater but boy was I wrong! Not only do I have a stimulator that does not provide much relief, I now have RSD in my back and buttocks area, basically, everywhere they cut is now affected with RSD. I not only have my daily meds and morphine but now I wear pain patches all over my back.

Do your research and due diligence before you jump into any type of invasive procedure anywhere on your body because the medical community does not fully understand or believe that RSD will spread or jump to other parts of your body. I am living proof that it does spread, jump and invade other areas than just the initial trauma area. If I can be of any further help to you feel free to send me a private message. I wish you the best of luck!