Well, I don't know about the failure or not of the fusion surgery through which I have gone because it seemed that the "back pain" as distinguished with the "nerve pain" which went down my legs was handled by the fusion work. The back was agonizing until the fusion and I "thought", maybe as you did, that I had been fixed. Glory hallelujah! Then the nerve pain showed not only that it was still there, but that it truly had been the worse of the two all along. I was in H E L L [gotta separate some of those words for the censor bots] with burning and this queer numbness. I was wondering "how can I burn SO BAD and be numb at the same time?

My neurosurgeon basically educated me that I had nerve damage, it was severe, time would tell whether it would get better, yada, yada, yada. It was not unusual to have the burning as I do from low back to my knees and the numbness below the knees [can't feel a thing so I use a cane and or a wheelchair depending on how far I have to go]. Give it time, a year, or more, to see if the nerve would regenerate as they supposedly do, and I was sent off to my physiatrist [pain doc] who had referred me for the fusion work in the first place because my whole body below my waist was at that time shutting down and nothing was functioning.

Back at the pain doc, a long time of doing what you have done, PT, meds, tens unit, and nothing worked, NOTHING...... and I hate morphine. So then we finally reached the discussion about Spinal Cord Stimulation. Pain Doc, a very compassionate man, said of any patient he had ever seen, I was the right patient to try the SCS. I feared it. Another SURGERY, and they would be goofing around with my spine again and the cord and nerves and all that. I finally agreed to give the thing a go after long consideration and prayer. My wife was for it. My life was just laying in bed in pain under med therapy......., not a life. So I gave it a go and the Trial Surgery worked wondrously well. I was sold. Get me in NOW! So after the long wait after Trial Surgery I finally had the full paddle laminectomy work done and now I am off of all, that is ALL pain meds and looking for work. Tomorrow at 9 am, I have my second interview with a company, so maybe, just maybe I will get back to work. I pray to God that I do. We need this. I do understand where you are coming from, believe me, I do, and you can read about it on my Boston Scientific Mini thread. I feel blessed.

So, from a fellow fusion mate, there are my two bits and I will gladly chime in on any question you have, anything at all.

Blessings on you,
Mark56