Originally Posted by rlj1959

I made the journey back to the VA hospital today and got some more bad news. I went to my primary care doctor because I have been having a lot of pain in my neck and shoulders. I thought it might be from stress with this blessed SSDI claim. I was wrong. This pain sometimes goes down my arms and it has started causing numbness in my arms and hands. I was diagnosed with severe cervical arthritis a couple of years ago. I use a tens machine to massage my neck and I do exercises for my neck. The doctor today sent me to x-ray, when she got the pictures on the computer, she called my orthopedic doctor. I had to go to his office because the ortho clinic is closed on Wednesday. He looked at the x-ray and sent me right back to x-ray for an MRI. After that, I went back to his office and sat there for an hour waiting for him. He finally came back and there was another older doctor with him. He introduced the other doctor and told me he was from the UAB Medical Center. They both looked at the MRI results and then he broke the news to me. My cervical arthritis has reached a very severe degenerative state. They both told me that surgery would probably not do any good at this point. He said about all I can do is use ice packs, heating pad and more pain medicine. He said that sometime in the not too distant future, I would have to have an Anterior Cervical Fusion in my neck. This has been one hell of a day. I can’t even walk because of my knee and now this lovely news.