Honestly, will I get relief from a cervical laminoplasty?

Please forgive me for being a bit confused,......I'm trying (to understand, not to be confused that is).

Usually with stenosis they do a decompression (remember, I'm not a doctor, I'm just meandering into your post). You also sound like you're having a lot of lower limb problems which makes me wonder if your lumbar spine is affected?

I'd encourage you to get a second opinion from a board certified neurosurgeon.

FYI: I have had what's been called "spinal reconstruction" of my lumbar spine and had to seek out a neuro (I hit the motherload with my doc, he's awesome) who specialized in traumatic spinal surgeries because I had so much going on.

But that's what jumped out at me, the complexities of symptoms.....

You're right, no guarantees with surgeries, and you're also right, the definition of success varies, among patients and among doctors.








M.

Hello Mark & welcome to the forum. First let me give you the name of an excellent spine website, its called SpineUniverse.com. It is dedicated to the spine only.

Here is something that is alarming about your post, keep in mind I am not a dr but someone with a great many years of experience in seeing people have different spine surgeries of all kind. The way the nerves & the dermatone patterns run, if a person is having cervical/neck problems then the pain symptoms involve the neck shoulders, hands, arms & fingers, all upper extremities. If the lumbar spine is involved then the pain symptoms involve of course the back, buttocks, hips, legs , feet & toes, all lower extremities. You say you can barely walk & have all that pain something is wrong here. Have you had an MRI or even a myelogram with a post contrast CT Scan of both the neck & back? I know you said they finally did a MRI of your neck.

If this were me, I would find myself a board certified, fellowship trained neurosurgeon & get another opinion. It never hurts to get other opinions & I sure would before letting anyone do any surgery on me.

Yes, if paralysis is in the picture & surgery is done to prevent it, sure that would be a success. However, when a dr tells a patient surgery is going to make the pain go away, that patient better run as fast as they can from that dr. A good dr will look a patient in the eye & say, the surgery can make you worse, better or the same. They have absolutely no way of knowing whether or not the pain will get any better when doing any surgery. Someone is telling you a crock. You may not like what I have written, but I am just being honest with you & I hope you will get some other opinions. I don't see either how a regular neurologist could have helped you either of these problems, this type of problem really isn't something they can help with. It also sounds like you had an EMG studies done. Those only have about a 75% accuracy rate too. Because nothing showed up on the lower one means nothing. I have seen the normal testing & when the dr did back surgery, found pinched nerves in the back. Like I said, not the most accurate test.

Anyway, welcome aboard & good luck.

This is my view on any type of back surgery. If you have gotten to the point where they can't screw anything up and make it worse then go for it. Personally I do not care how highly rated any back surgeon is they are a surgeon and they make their living slicing into people and most of them will only emphasize the good points and positive outcomes of surgery.

Recently there is a doctor, a back surgeon, who came out with a study that says a vast majority of back surgeries done today are either not needed or that they will not help to correct the problem(s) for which they are advertised to. He went on to say that many times treatment with pain killers is the way to go.

There are a lot of pain killers available and tramadol is the "weakest" one currently available. It is also well known that depending on the type of pain a person has some non narcotic pain killers work a lot better than their narcotic brothers. Pain killers such as Lyrica and Cymbalta work well on nerve pain where narcotic ones do not.

Post Edited (Jim1969) : 5/17/2014 11:26:58 AM (GMT-6)

Mark64 depending on what is actually going on in your cervical spine, yes indeed the cervical spine could be causing problems anywhere down from that point in the cervical spine. Most of the time it is the nerve roots coming off the spinal cord that are impinged and causes problems, pain, numbness and tingling and even paralysis of that area that the nerve root innervates! But if there is problem with the spinal cord its self then any thing below that level can be affected! It all depends on what nerve cells in that area of the spinal cord is injured or damaged!!! Stenosis can be caused in several areas, the narrowing of the opening that the nerve root passes through, or the narrowing of the spinal canal its self, if the narrowing is of the spinal canal and it is putting pressure on the actual spinal cord, then it could very well be causing you to have problems with your lower part of your body to! Again it all depends on what cells in that area of the spinal cord is injured or damaged and not functioning correctly! That is why when people have major spinal cord damage, if it is lower in their spine, they can be a paraplegic, but if it is higher in the spine, like the cervical area you can become quadriplegic!

Surgery is easier for the surgeon in the cervical spine, I have heard that from at least two neurosurgeons! But the if there is major damage in the cervical spine it can be allot more devastating than when it is lower in the spine! I the first time I had to have my ACDF at C6/7 my pain was all in my arms, but the disk was pressing directly into my spinal cord and deforming it! The neurosurgeon, literally told me, that I must have had someone guarding over me! because there was absolutely no reason at all that (with the damage I had) , that I shouldn't be a quadriplegic! To say the least I felt very very lucky! The neurosurgeon was able to remove the disc and fish out all the free floating fragments of the disc that were in my spinal canal, I didn't lose a any mobility and it immediately stopped the pain in my arms. I did lose my voice after the surgery for a little over three months, and I had some swallowing difficulties, and even to this day I have partial paralysis of my right vocal cords. But I am not a quadriplegic! So I am thankful! That surgery was done in March of 1985 and I was 33 at that time!

So there is hope for you Mark64! I do wish you well an hope this all works out for you!

PS. When this first happened to me I was in the Air Force, and an Army Orthopedic surgeon told I was malingering and it was also all in my head, and they sent me to the shrink! It took them at least three months before they finally found out what was wrong with me, and then they deemed it was an emergency and I ended up being sent to a civilian hospital and civilian neurosurgeon in downtown Anchorage Alaska to have the surgery done!

I truly can empathize with your Mark64

Thanks folks. I've gotten a lot of helpful advice so far. Looks like I need to push on the health system a little bit more. It also looks like I need to manage my expectations a bit better.

Leg problems can come from cervical spine too. After getting my cord compressed at C3-4 I now have awful pain in my shoulders and neck and numbness and pain and spasticity in my hands and legs.

http://www.urmc.rochester.edu/neurosurgery/for-patients/treatments/cervical-decompression.aspx

Welcome Vanessa to the forum and if you would go to the " post new topic" and in the heading or subject line put looking for info on laminectomy you would get more replies. Being a older thread many will not see your post and we have folks here who can help with your husbands questions.

Welcome to you both and thanks