Any Advice?
 

:confused:Hello, I am new to this site and am looking for any advice that can help me. A couple of months ago I was diagnosed with vascular and nurological TOS. My TOS was caused by a cervical rib. At that time we decided to try just physical therapy. This has not helped me at all, I still feel the same and everything is still just as tight as it always has been. Now my doctor wants me to try trigger point injection of Lidocaine and Marcaine. If I don't want to do that then he wants me to see a manual physical therapist. I don't know what to do. I am terrified of needles but does the benifits of trigger point injections outweigh my fear? If there is any advice that anyone can give me that would be great. How painful are the injections? I feel very lost and frustrated at the same time.

The injections really aren't that painful, I've had several of them. It's nothing compared to the TOS pain. Unfortunately in my case they didn't help any at all.

They're a little painful afterwards. If you take a pain pill before that will help. They helped me a lot and I still have them.

Do the injections. It's way easier than a surgery.

and if injections don't work, at least you know you've tried everything possible BEFORE removing the extra rib.

good luck!

Hello and Welcome-

Have you had some problems with this all your life, from the c rib, or did it come on slowly? Due to work, accidents or postures?

Oh and some are a large full set and some are just small and not a complete set of extra c ribs. Did you see you films or did the dr say anything about size, partial or full set?

If it's always been some sort of problem then removal might be a good idea.
If the main cause of trouble is from the extra c rib - usually the surgery for that will have a better result.
But of course only go to an expert surgeon if you do consider any surgery.
{leave surgery as a last resort- well unless you are having serious vascular compressions}

there is good PT and not so good- if they are making you do weights/arm bands while you are still in pain - it's not good.
are they focusing on gentle posture improvement & correction and pain reduction?

i hope you have time to read thru many of our other threads and our useful sticky-
http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/thread84.html

what are your worst symptoms?

I guess I've noticed problems with my c rib for several years, I just didn't know that it was there. I could always feel a lumb near my neck and it would be the source of pain off and on. I even went to a doctor to find out what the lump was and they just told me it was scar tissue so I left it at that for a long time. Until last year when the pain never went away and it just kept getting worse. They finally did a chest x-ray and found the rib. It's a full right rib and it's only on the right side. Even after they found it, it was hard to find a doctor that would help me. I felt like no one believed that I was even in pain and that the pain was as severe as it was and still is. I'm all for trying most anything before surgery, and I could have done the shots when I was in the doc's office the other day but I was too scared. I'm deathly afraid of needles and I paniced. He told me to look it up on the web and get info about it and decide if I wanted to do it. My other option is manual PT. That's how I found this site. They have me doing both weights and bands in PT, I've got almost a book of things they want me to do, but it's not helping any. I'm still the same as I was before. Thanks for the advice.

Twila:)

Thanks for the good advice everyone, it's very helpful.

Twila:)

Your PT should not be having you use weigts and bands. That builds muscle which causes more compression.


would type more, but am too tired. I hope someone else can add to this.

:hug::(