cervical fusion problems
 

today i went to see neurologist and took recent xrays. well on of the screws had broken in half and another on is coming out; one of the vertrebrae is not fusing and dr wants to give me ctscan. has anyone experienced this before.

Hello, no, but I am horrified for you. I had the proceedure in 01 and except for it being the catalyst for my MS diagnosis, was lucky. I was afraid nod or
turn my head for several years:D however.

I hope that they get you sorted out soon. How long ago was your surgery?

cervical fusion problem
 

hi kami. i had my sugery in sept. 06. the dr said that since it hasn't been very long there is no need to worry right now. ct scan in august and see what that shows. i am glad that you didn't have to go thru this sort of thing. it is very scary.how is you doing with your ms. i don't know too much about ms my prayers are with you and thanks for talking to me.

Hi Lolo..
Sorry to hear of your troubles. I had cervical fusion at c4/5 5/6 in february of this year and am doing really well. I noticed on my last xray that one of my cages looks very crooked though...I hope I am not headed the same direction. I thought hardware failure was rare, and I see more and more cases where it is happening.. it is scary as I went back to a heavy lifting job just 3 weeks after surgery.

Good Luck!
Dave

hi dave. on my last xray i noticed that one of cages was crooked. dr said cage looked good just problem with screws and fusion. ask your dr about the cage looking crooked. my dr still have me on light duty even tho i have lifted heavy things. maybe this heavy lifting is more harmful to our neck healing than we thought.be careful and don't overdo.

I had a C5-6-7 fusion in August 05. 22 months ago. The neuro placed me on a permanent 10 pound weight lifting restriction above shoulder level. I had an MRI a month ago and he says now the disks at C4-5 and C4-3 are also bulging and I will probably need to have them fused as well. I would be really carefully about lifting anything heavy. I have heard it can cause all kinds of problems....

hi stiffnecked, thanks for replying. i should have followed my dr advice completely instead of being hard headed and lifting heavy abjects. i believe that could be the reason for the non fusion. do you still have any pain in your neck. what will you do about further surgery? i am really sorry that you have to go thru this. this is not something i would want to go thru again. take care of yourself and keep us posted about what you decide.

I hope everything works out for you and they can take care of the issue. I had my neck done six years ago with good results, except now my lower back is shot. But anyway, I often worry its going to come apart at my neck. So I can only imagine how upsetting it can be. I hope it all turns out ok.
Good Luck,
Deb

thanks deb hopefully i will know more in august. i am really happy to see your surgery worked out so well. take care of yourself.