quality of life/advise & Norspan patches

I had to add little more here...WOW!....I read your full post, and you are having a very rough time arnt you! hang in there, as there will be someone here who is better suited than I'am to answer your questions. I understand the loss of quality of life that you are talking about. If your Dr can get the meds adjusted right for you, it helps a bunch with that very thing. Check here often and please keep us updated on your progress.

Post Edited (Screaming Eagle) : 11/13/2009 8:37:50 AM (GMT-7)

I dont know much about pain managment and what is available here in Australaia, this all so new to me but i need to learn as much as possible and know my options , because I cannot cope with the pain as you are all aware of how chronic pain effects our daily living, its a nightmare at the moment.

I am not familiar with pain managment injections or what is used etc... I  bascially only have the knowlege of the meds i have taken in the past (Codeine, Tramadol and endep ), which were relativley effective until fairly recently. I have been putting up with the pain as much as possible but it has become worse to the point of unbearable and constant, some days better than others but most days quite severe.

What is facet injections ? i  must sound so naive and uneducated (lol)

My husband said the same that i read to much, and require credible sources, as i have become anxoius after reading so many conflicting stories and  information. Thankyou for the info regarding some website i can visit, much appreciated.

Do you know the reason as to why the PM Drs in the States are avoiding the medication issue?

The CP101, thread is great, very imformative.

Thankyou

Hope you are feeling well, is your PM under control?

Cheers from downunder!

Thankyou, a pleasure to meet with you also.

I am here to stay and i am so glad i did find the forum and find you all, its lifted my spirits as i am so anxoius and aphrehensive, i need to slow down and take one thing at a time as i junp to conclusions and that being the worst for some silly reason.

The norpan patches are not available yet in the states but i believe its not to far away,  Buprenorphine

Is the main ingreidant, there are 5, 10 & 20 mg patches the pain relief is supposed to last for 7 days then a new patch applied to the skin,i have only had the patch on since Friday and at 10 mg, they say it takes 3 days to become effective , i am praying that this is the case as my pain is chronic and sometimes is just bearable and other times i am in extreme pain.

I would love to hear from anyone willing to talk about how they cope with chronic pain? including meds, theraphy,cold compress, heat packs ointments etc... or anything else that has been effective in reducing pain.

When you say  Idiopathic do you mean degenerative?- Information i have is that degenerative scoliosis occures around 40 years of age, My curve has only moved slightly since my first lot of x-rays when i was 18 or 19.  i had another lot of x-rays at the age of 22 years of age. I am sheduled this week to have the next set of x-rays (now at 41 YRS of age ) to see if the curve has moved any further or stayed the same, my fingers are crossed that it hasnt curved anymore x.

i am not sure on the thoughts of surgery required by adults with moderate to severe scoloisis, i am aware that it used to be rectified on younger children before reaching late teens

.My cousin had surgery at the age of 12 years old, placed two metal rods between the spine to assist it to grow in the correct manner, years later they removed the rods and she now has a straight spine and lives an active pain free life, you wouldnt even know she had it, if you were not told. i dont now how they go in surgery for adults, i am being refered to a orthpeadic surgeon, for his option and will discuss the risks, and  find out what percentage of this surgury has been succesful.

I am going to request a MRI and a CT to check for nerve and spinal cord damage and disc damage, apparently you can have a nerve test. My pain has increased and is intensified dramatically, and apparently this is a symptom of degenerative damage along with a list of others, i experience thorasic pain, severe shoulder and neck pain, and tingling warm numbness pain in the lower back.

Does anyone here sufferer lower back pain with numbness and tingling hot pain? Should i apply hot or cold paks? i would like to hear if any of this has assisted others for a little relief.

Thankyou once again for your warm welcome, and nice to meet you too. hoping you are feeling pain free as  possible.

Cheers from

Australia

PAlady said...
Punchfit,
I think if you follow along with us for awhile you're going to see that many of us struggling with answering some of the same questions you ask. You're right that it helps immensely to have others to talk with who not only experience CP, but have been through a lot of procedures, medications, etc. It is important to remember, though, we're not doctors, and everyone's reaction is different so you still need to take things - especially responses to medication - as opinion and not fact.

Compared to many forums, this is great because of how it's moderated, and the forum rules kind of keep us coloring in the lines, so to speak! LOL But it is still a forum.

I know I never had low back pain until I took a bad fall back in 2004 (Nov. 5, 2004 - funny a date can change our lives). I tore the ACL in my left knee and within a couple of months started having back pain, pain down my right leg, and slowly developed numbness and tingling in both feet. I still have those symptoms after lots of Physical Therapy (PT), numerous injections - which often contain steroids with the hope of calming the pain for at least a few months, and finally, a double lumbar fusion. I had a lot of PT after my surgery, but still, the symptoms never improved. Sometimes nerves that are compressed or injured for too long don't heal. What I have learned is the spine and nerves are complex and challenging parts of the body!

I did a lot of studying on websites usually associated with major medical centers like the Cleveland Clinic, etc. to learn a lot about anatomy - although I am still a novice. I think the website Cleveland Clinic contributes to was www.spineuniverse.com. I'm not sure if it's ok to put that in the post, but I don't think they have a forum there that competes with HW and I have no monetary connection with them (check the forum rules to know what I'm talking about!). But they were a very user friendly site for a lay person, giving a lot of diagrams of the spine, and so I was able to understand what "facet joints" look like, etc. They're a part of the spinal structure. Injections can be given into a variety of places in the spine; the facet joints are one part. I had facet joint injections before my surgery for diagnostic purposes - which means they givev you some medication and if it stops the pain then they've managed to find the right site. Doctors thought maybe because there was so much arthritis in the facet joints that they could be causing the problem, but the injections didn't help, so they weren't.

I don't know much about the complications with adult scoliosis but Dani seems to know more, and again, I'd suggest you go to the websites of some of the major medical centers (not sure what they might be in Australia, but you can still get info. from websites in the states) and read, read, read! I also went to a site www.medscape.com which is affiliated with a site doctors use to get their journal information, www.medline.com. Medscape is free, and has more articles oriented for us lay folk, but you can access some of the journal articles (same things the doctors read) searching Medline. Sometimes you have to be a member to get certain info. from Medline, and there's a fee for that. I can't tell you how many articles I printed out on lumbar fusion surgery before I had mine! But there were sections that were over my head - but it at least gave me some info, and some things to ask my doctor. It can also give you an idea if you search the site about treatments for adult scoliosis. I'm sure each case would be different.

Ok, I've gone on long enough. Hope some of this helps! And don't forget to search the old threads of Healing Well. There's a lot of good information in them, but again much of it is our experiences and opinions.

PaLady

straydog said...
Hi Punchfit, I too would like to welcome you to HW although I am a little late in doing so. I am so glad you found us but very sorry to see another person come along with CP. From reading your post you have had more than our fair share of suffering, a lot of it it needlessly, that's so sad. You were terribly young to start down this road. Under treated pain should be made a criminal offense because its just rampant.

No dr should ever question a patient when the patient is simply stating "I want some quality life". If it was only that easy. I was glad to see that you did advocate for care from your dr. Many of us are having to do this more and more. You are entitled to that.

As some has said you should try to find a pain mgt dr to handle your pain. You have not and most likely in the future will not receive the kind of pain mgt care you will need as time goes on with the dr you have now. Your dr is too concerned with issues down the road and not concerned with taking care of the immediate problem. You need to be able to function and take care of your family. CP takes a lot away from us but there are ways to keep some aspects of our life intact.

Drug addiction in the US makes it hard for many of us to get good medical care. The drug seekers has really ruined for us that need certain medications to function. No one likes to take medication but sometimes it is a way to survive. There is a big, big difference between addiction and tolerance issues. We can become tolerant to our pain medications just like we can become tolerant to diabetes medicine, blood pressure medication, antibiotics and such. Sometimes we may need higher doses or even need to change to something totally different. Many do not understand this, they choose to stick their heads in the sand. The best thing you can do is educate yourself on CP and the medications used to treat it. It can be scarey but all medications have possible side effects, but it does not mean it will happen to you.

You had asked about using heat or cold methods. That is something to try for yourself to see which one works the best. For me heat works best, cold makes it worse. Moist heat is much better than dry heat too. Take care and please keep posting, I think you found out you are not alone.