Hi All,
I'm a 48 year old woman. I had both knees replaced at the same time last May 15, 2006. The Dr. told me that the severe pain in my back was from a bakers cyst that was wrapped around my sciatic nerve in my knee, and once I had the replacements done I would have no more back pain. Guess what, that wasn't it and the pain was horrendous and has been for a year. I had to wait for 3 months to get an MRI done because of my implants. Got into a neurosurgeon in August of 2006. The first one told me I had degenerative disc disease and cysts all over my tail bone but there wasn't anything that could be done for me. But he sent me to the other side of his practice to have a discogram done. That dr. vetoed the discogram and decided to do steroidal shots and said that he hoped this would buy me 2-3 years of semi free pain until the risk of infection from surgery from my knees were over. 2nd treatment he did caused nerve damage and I had to have my right leg by my replaced knee operated on to release the nerves and said hopefully I may get some feeling back in that leg in about a year. I ended up seeing all 5 neurosurgeons there and kept getting worse. My husband said at my dec. appt if you have to open her up to stop this then just do it she can't take much more. Dr's response was I'm afraid if we do we will make her worse, I'm releasing her with a referral to another Neuro center. This is May 8th and I have my first appt there next Thursday. My first neurosurgeon told me that if you have cysts on the spine they never do anything for them anymore, reading this site today and a couple of others brought up a whole lot of questions. I've suffered from herniated discs, spinal stenosis, spondyliosis, arthritis to name a few for the last year and the drs have diagnosed it but won't do anything. My family dr is taking care of my pain meds right now. I guess I'm rambling but is there anyone else out there suffering this much and not getting help.