Thank you sooo much for this post.

I had a tibial plateau fracture just before my diagnosis of PN, and they casted me from toe all the way up to my hip...three days and two trips to the ER, later they had to cut the cast off I was in such incredible pain...they thought I was nuts.

It was a stress fracture and they told me that I should not be in that severe of pain. They did cut off the cast and that helped a lot....they just gave me a huge boot then and said stay off. It never dawned on that orthopedist, that I had a neuro problem and I told him my legs were tingling and going numb prior to the fracture being discovered. It also took one year and a 'coil' to heal it. It still hurts....and that is because the knee is unstable. And--I was in super good shape when this happened, so it isn't the fracturee's fault... about 2 years later I found out I had profound nerve fiber loss below the knee.

Well, it was the neuropathy, not the break that hurt so bad....I didn't think about that until now, and of course I did not have neuropathy.

This also validates for me how PN can cause all these bone and joint problems I have been struggling with for many years now.

Julie, I think it is best to err on the side of caution, and use whatever one needs to prevent falls. Ides is correct....a broken bone with a cast is agony when you have PN....and Ides, I will be a whole lot more careful now....BTW, I have herniated discs in my T spine and feel my spine is unstable, and I recently found out this can affect the spinal alignment as the paravertebral and intravertebral muscles can lose innervation.

This condition is hugely complex....one reason I put the scope of PN posting up.