If you've had ACDF surgery, would you help me with some advice?

Welcome to our forum. I am sorry but I have no answers for you but wanted to welcome you and say
hang in there. I would think the surgeon who performed the operation would be the best person to ask these questions of. Since you can not talk I would write down your questions and have your husband ask the doctor for you, and have him write down the answers,

Hello IAmGranny & welcome to the chronic pain forum. So sorry you have to be here but glad that you found us.

Yes, we have had several members that have had neck surgery and hopefully they will be popping on & telling you their experiences. Weekends tend to be slow so keep checking in.

For whatever reason the difficulty in swallowing is something that seems to go with this type of surgery. I have seen this happen to a lot of folks. The good news it is temporary, the same with speaking. One of our mods lost his voice for a couple of months & over time it came back. As far as washing the wound I would think no, normally they want them kept dry. I would call & ask the surgeon's nurse about this and the other questions about a bandage. Did they not give your husband any postop papers with instructions? A phone call to the nurse should get you some answers. I can't answer your question about the pillow, I would think whatever is comfortable for you. I would take breaks from the computer & not stay in one position long, I am surprised that you are able to do that.

Anyway, I wanted to pop on & say hello & welcome aboard. Take care......

Hi Granny!

I haven't had the surgery that you had (sorry) but I did recently discover that I have a staph infection. I kept breaking out in boils... Super painful boils and the ER ran some tests and voilà, I have staph. They put me on Keflex as well but the doctor told me I can just take two of the pills every twelve hours. Ask your doctor if that's okay. It doesn't solve all your problems but at least you could cut down the war with water a little bit. I hope this heare so many helpful folks on this site and many of them have had back issues. I'm sure they'llbe along to help and offer suggestions soon!

There arw

Hi Grammy.

I'm a grammy too. I have had the fusion, in C3-4.

Last summer I fell in the garden, hit my head on a rock, full weight pushing in a garden stake. I heard the bone spur snap (thought it was neck bone breaking) and then was paralyzed, no feeling, shoulders down. I found later I had crushed 6 vertebrae cervical, thoracic and lumbar. I had burst a disc too. The surgeon used a chunk of cadaver bone to replace the piece of C3 I crushed, screws and plate C3-4.

After a long while I started to be able to move my toes so I said, "there's hope" and started yelling for help. My grandsons heard me and told their mom who ran to the rescue.

Anyway, don't sweat the steri strips. At 10 days the skin has healed. Go ahead and wash gently. The strips will fall off soon. The little thin scar is no big deal. It will disappear into your neck wrinkles. Nothing to be worried about hiding.

Swallowing: The surgeon used a retractor to pull your esophagus and trachea to the side so he could get all the way down the the front side of the spine to do the fusion. It can take months to get swallowing back properly. I had a feeding tube for a week or maybe longer. I don't remember much of the first month in hospital. I had a hard time with that because I had had polio as a child. If you can swallow applesauce, use it with your pills. Get a pill crusher from any pharmacy for anything that can be crushed. Some capsules can be opened, but ask your doctor AND your pharmacist AND look up the drugs on the official websites. I chew up the 3 tramadol and one Norco a day I am allowed.

Turning head. There's a lot of damage still healing, but you are screwed together. If your neck gets tired ask for a soft neck brace to use only when it's too tired to hold up by yourself. I only had the hard collar on for about a week, then doc said I didn't need it, much to the surprise of me, nurses, aides. My neck got weak because I was in hospital a long time, then in nursing home re-learning to walk and use my arms.

The pain you described BEFORE the fall is worrisome. Have you talked about that with the surgeon? A rehab doctor? It sounds like "central core syndrome." Hopefully that's gone and won't come back, but it could even months or years later. I got it about the second month and mine will not ever go away because I have "central pain syndrome" on top. It's kind of like getting diabetic nerve pain but it's from the messages going to the brain getting scrambled at the point of injury and the brain thinking it's all pain. There are NO meds that help even the slightest with this pain. I've tried one after another, after another. This syndrome can get worse after another injury.

"Real pain" (not the messed up messages) get through to the brain just fine, unfortunately. I have some chunks floating around in my left shoulder causing impinging and decreased range of motion. Until I get way more healed I just can't have any more surgery, so I am putting up with a lot of pain. My docs have helped the shoulder pain a little with facet joint injections at C5 - which is where neck pain radiating to shoulder comes from. But they won't let me have enough pain med to dull it enough to sleep. Injections into the shoulder joint might help you, but they didn't help me at all, not even a little.

Pillow: I can't find one I like. I feel I need some neck support. The so-called neck pillows with body-shaping foam don't bounce back, and I feel like I'm sleeping with my head on a board. We need a foam neck pillow. Maybe someone will find one for us.

Best wishes.

Unfortunately, hospitals are a notorius place for picking up staph infections. Back in the early 90's my husband picked up staph in an ER, a week later he was admitted to the hospital & he spent 28 days in the hospital. It is a hard infection to get rid of. We actually harbor staph in our bodies & it will generally hit a weak spot.

I picked up C-diff which is another wicked infection at a hospital & spent 5 days in the hospital. Like you, this was a brand new hospital, had been open 3 months.

Hope you get over your infection quickly.

You know like you I would have never imagine picking up the type of infections in a hospital. Many, many years ago one of our larger hospitals had a bad problem with their operating rooms, a great number of people that had surgery was getting staph infections. They did everything possible trying to get rid of it & they ended up gutting those rooms & rebuilding them. That was the only way they could get rid of it. I worked for some attys & several of our clients had surgery & also got staph there.

I was not aware of us carrying staph until an infectious disease dr told me this. He said sometimes what happens is it will attack a weak area of the body. An example a guy goes to the dr & the dr injects his shoulder because he is having trouble with it. The dr does the standard protocol of cleaning the area with betadine & all of that jazz. The guy ends up with a staph infection. As it turns out the guy has a deviated septum (not from drug use) & this is a weakened area so to speak & staph sets in. The injection had nothing to do with it since the dr prepped the area as he should have. All I know, is if it is not brought under control it can be destructive. I hope you continue to improve.

Hi Imagranny!

I went to a "Fancy" hospital and they told me at preop that 50% of us carry staph in our noses. They swabbed mine and a couple of days later called me back saying I did carry it. They gave me a medicine to swab in my nose for 5 days preop. I bathed with special soap for 4 days preop. . .it sounds like not all hospitals are doing this. The most likely source of staph is unfortunately you. That doesnt mean you are "dirty" or did anything wrong, I'm just illustrating you can go to the best, cleanest hospital in the world but if you bring in the bug then they should have been cleaning you better.

Water is a nit tricky at first, but it gets better. I had very few issues, but throat issues are common and typically get better, That said, you have hardware in there now and it is taking the place of something. My esophagus is much narrower now and large pills like neurontin 800mg get stuck easily. Apples too. . .and I love apples. This is the burden we sign up for, knowingly or not. I really wish it were more widely now the ramifications of these surgeries. The doctors are too busy to really explain it and they have seen so much worse than your case that they are desensitized. . .its the only way to do the job long term.

I am going to check the forum rules, but if they allow it I am going to post links to the pillows that helped me. Brace yourself, they are $200. I am also typing fully reclined in my LaZBoy from an articulating aluminum table. Easily the best money I have spent. These computers are our only ties to the outside world, although I use my smartphone a lot too. . .it just doesnt work great on here.

The name of the stuff your looking for is called "Thick-it " and any drug store should carry it! Generally found with the supplements like ensure and sustacal, sometimes on the aisle where products for the disabled are, enlarged handled utensils, potty risers? Ask if you can't find it and its completely tasteless so you can mix it with any
thing that you want thicker!

Scs welcome to HW! We would love for you to start a introduction post of your own, replying to a thread folks may not notice and give you a proper welcome to the forum. Top of the page and click "new topic "

Pulled myself away from the laptop for a few days so I fell behind keeping up with this thread. It's catch-up time.

For White Beard: They're telling me it could take up to 6 months for the voice to come back, but I do practice every day, when I'm alone. I retired from the music industry, but I'd still like to impress my shower, if I can. I think I'm getting a little more volume, but I do sound like a friend of mine who had a tracheotomy, presently, and a bit breathless. Who am I kidding; it's pathetic. I need to pace myself, since I'm only 14 days post-op, but my family are all talkers. (When I was a little girl, my bus driver told me that if I ever got lockjaw, I'd blow up, ha!) The arm pain I had sounds so similar to yours and, I know it seems hard to imagine that a single arm could bring someone to their knees but I may as well have had it caught in a threshing machine during all this.

You know, my doctor didn't order a collar so I have no idea at all if I'm holding my head correctly. For that reason, I'm asking: if I feel some faint "similar" pain in my left shoulder blade and sometimes in the left upper arm, even after they removed the bone spurs and replaced the disks and declared the nerve to be free from compression... and I do mean faint, almost a "phantom reminder" that comes and goes... is that normal? Could that just be because of the way I sit or sleep so that it's a legitimate sore muscle or should I be concerned? (As I said, I'm only 14 days out.)

For therabidweasel You and I share an affinity for apples. There is nothing in this world I'd rather have than a cold "Red Delicious" apple. I've noticed that I have to nibble it, rather than voraciously devour it like I once did. But I'll find a way to get one down; it's an addiction with me. I'd love to know about the pillow. That seems a small price to pay for being able to sleep. I've been awake the past few nights. I have plenty of narcotics all sitting there looking at me, but honestly... they don't work. Not even Dilaudid or Soma. I don't have enough pain to justify taking them anyway, but from a sleep standpoint, I honestly think they've backfired and are now keeping me awake. Something is. I was thinking of a small bit of Melatonin.

For Scscurious and nvrthesame98 Thanks so much for letting me know about "Thick-it". I have never heard of it before, but I'm going to pick some up. (I wonder if I could learn to like "thick" coffee?) HA! I've not finished a cup of black coffee since my surgery. The first few sips are okay but as the coffee cools down, I lose interest. It just takes too long to drink it without choking.

Just a question in general: If the doctor did not prescribe a collar of any type but my neck gets "tired" from holding up my head (it's suddenly feeling like a bowling ball on a stick) is there any harm in purchasing a soft collar just to wear when I'm watching TV or working online? I'm just not conscious of how I'm holding my head, but I must be doing something wrong, because my neck is "tired" all the time. I've heard that soft collars might keep me from flopping my neck around too much in my sleep. What are your thoughts on this?

Thanks, everyone!

My follow-up isn't for another couple of weeks but I might be able to manage sweet-croaking the surgeon's nurse into calling me back, so I'll ask.

Nothing to be alarmed about, if I have suddenly begun feeling very faint "suggestions" of pain in my previous issue-locations? Nerve coming back to life?

Thanks!

Grammy, by chance are you on a good muscle relaxer? A good muscle relaxer is must right after surgery. If you are not on something, put in a call to the drs nurse & tell her you are having muscle spasms. WhiteBeard can tell you about severe muscle spasms after surgery.

Take care.

I did buy a soft collar today because I'm on the computer a lot and I'm sure I'm not conscious of how I move my head when my mind is elsewhere. I thought I'd at least wear it during times like that. It's the first time I've ever worn one and it is… well, something else, if you're not used to one, isn't it? I look like Jim Varney as Ernest (YouTube search "Ernest Dressed Like A Woman"). Okay, I don't look quite that bad, but my face is doing some scary stuff!

Well, I guess the pain is my own stupid fault. I was sent home with Soma and Dilaudid and, because I wasn't hurting, I stopped taking either. I just couldn't figure out which (if either) was keeping me up at night, but starting about a week ago, I was just staring into the darkness all night, my mind racing like a bullet about stupid, unimportant things, and then, as soon as it started getting daylight, I'd drag myself out of bed and just sit stupidly on the couch, exhausted. This went on for about three nights in a row, so I stopped taking them. Last night, I took a Tylenol and some Melatonin. I did nap in and out, better than nothing, I suppose. But now that I'm reading what you guys are saying, it seems that I should at least be taking the Soma. I'll begin that again. I'm such a rookie.