Lindaky,

Some of the most knowledgable people on this forum don't get on here every day, much less every hour. Some only check in once a week or less. You've only allowed ~9 hours for a response!
Please... have a little patience.

Injections? There are many kinds of injections - some diagnostic, and some therapeutic, and different kinds of therapeutic ones. Did he state specifically what kind of injections wouldn't help you and why? A callback might be warranted. Did the pain doc have any suggestions for controlling your pain?

The way you've stated it, I can't tell where the "results" end and your comments continue, and the snippet you've given us isn't really enough to guess at other than that you seem to have severe nerve signal loss at L5-S1(?)

If you have a copy of the report (you should - if not, request one) you can look up the terms in the Medical Dictionary at the top righthand corner of every NT page. This is how many of us have learned to read our own reports. You can also google compound terms - include define or meaning in your search criteria.

Doc

Nice weather, weekends & holidays are usually slower for responses, for most forums that I have noticed.

Do you have a MRI & report also, that might give better clues for members to help you with.
EMG mostly proves that a nerve is affected, but an MRI should show where the cause is coming from.

The injections IF they work, would ONLY help with the pain. They would NOT solve the problem that the EMG is stating that you have, which is nerve impingement.

You must remember too, that EMG's are not ALWAYS accurate. Yours sounds pretty accurate, but we can't always rely on them 100%.

If in fact you DO have severe impingement of the nerves, and are facing permanent nerve damage, you MIGHT be a candidate for surgery. BUT you would have to talk with your neurosurgeon about this. I would get a 2nd opinion on this before I'd jump into surgery tho, as surgery should be a LAST RESORT. Surgery is NOT for relieving pain. It's only for correcting mechanical problems. While you may get pain relief, you may also end up in the same pain or worse. So don't expect to be pain free from surgery because that just not realistic in most cases.

I hope you get some good news from the Neuro. PLEASE let us know what you find out, ok? God bless & take care. Hugs, Lee

First of all, I want to apologize for my impatience yesterday. I now realize that I had not given anyone much time at all to respond to me. I was in alot of pain and was just wanting some kind of answers and as most of you all know when you are in pain, you just want someone to listen to you. I do apologize. I have been given some meds to help with the pain I am having but as most know, it does not come close to relieving it. I have just started going to the pain Dr so they are only beginning to treat me and building me up (their words, not mine)on my meds. They do not want to just throw me into some meds all at once. I understand what they are doing but at the same time, it is rough dealing with the pain. As for the injections, I have done the epidurals before and they were useless. When they said injections would not help me they were including all the ones they do and believe me that includes alot because this is a very big place and they do a large number of injections. Since reading the replies on here I did look up my tests results in the med dictionary as someone suggested and t is not very encouraging. This is not my first EMG, have been going thru all this since 2008, just prayed at some point it would get better. Thank you for the well wishes I truly believe I need them. [I[/I]

I don't know what terms they've slung at you, but many/most of us have (heard the term) Degenerative Disc Disease. Degenerative means (among other things) that it's not going to get any better, so as Ginnie says, we know what it's like - the pain, the frustration, the discouragement - we're on the same journey. About the best we can do, surgery notwithstanding, is try to slow the progression however we can, share our experiences/learning (and pain) and get by one day at a time.

Ironically, one secondary effect of chronic pain seems to be developing big shoulders...

Doc