OT Back Problems

[sw1211]

I'm mainly a lurker trying to absorb the wealth of information here.  I recently took the plunge and started my Festool collection.  Unfortunately my back has been such that I haven't been able to use them yet. I had a good pain-free week a few weeks ago and thought things were improving so I started my slide down the slope. Does anyone have 1st hand experience with cortisone injections in the back?  I've been to two specialists.  One wants to do facet joint injections the other wants to inject directly into one of my disks.  What they both tell me makes sense and sticking needles in my back isn't something I'm really looking forward to.  I'm trying to determine which course of action to take.

A bit of medical history.  I've had low back issues on and off most of this year, progressively getting worse.  I've had over 50 visits to Physical Therapy. This offers some relief but nothing long-term. The back specialists say if that hasn't improved me by now it probably won't in the future.  I've tried Chiropractors and acupuncture.  Purchased a new bed.  Ice, heat, combinations of both, hot tubs, etc.  Ingested various prescription and over the counter meds.  Nothing has provided relief to now.  I've had an MRI and x'rays.  The two lowest disks in the SI, L4 & L5 area show some degeneration with a touch of arthritis in the facet joints, is the Readers Digest version of the diagnosis.

I hope you don't mind a medical post here but my back is preventing me from powering up my new Festools, so it is loosely related.

Any help/insights/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.  I just wish Jerry Work had a manual on back issues, as thorough as he is I'm sure he'd have a solution.  ;D

Steve

 

[Matthew Schenker]

Steve,
Welcome to the group.

I'm very sorry to hear about your back issues.  My wife suffers from something similar, which has to do with muscles rather than bones, but it is a debilitating condition.  I bring it up because she has also been to physical therapists and tried many medicines and painkillers.  Recently, we discovered a form of therapy I can administer myself.  We even bought a massage table.  It has made a huge difference in her life.

More directly related to your story, my father suffers from disc degeneration in his lower back.  He was told that surgery is not an option, because the state of his discs was so bad.  He went for cortisone injections a few months ago, and has been suffering much, much less since then.  When I see him now, he is pretty much able to move as usual.  Before the injections, his whole body revealed that he was in constant pain (and he's not one to ever reveal pain).

Without knowing your particular situation, I don't know how you and my father compare.  But it has done a lot for him, and he said the shots themselves were not bad.

Maybe someone else here can add some other personal stories on this.

Keep us updated and let us know how it goes.

Matthew

 

[Eli]

I have a torn bulging disk in my neck. I use massage and yoga (and the occasional hydrocodone) to keep it in line. Stress is best avoided, as that makes it much worse. I've had friends get the injections, and they seem to work well on the short term.

 

[Jesse Cloud]

Interesting topic.  My back starts to complain after a long session bending over the MFT.  I wonder if it could be tricked out to be more ergonomic.  Maybe if th backside were taller than the front you wouldn't have to lean over so far, would have to reconfigure the fence and rail so workpieces wouldn't fall off.  Panel saws, for instance, are almost vertical...hmm....

Has anyone tried anything like that?

 

[Lou Miller]

I've had a really bad back problem for several years. I have no choice but to work through the pain. My pain is in the lower back (l4,l5) and it goes down my right leg and into my right foot. I've been taking Dilaudid and Lyrica and they both help some. I went through Vicodin, Oxycontin and several other drugs. I didn't like most of them because of the side effects (bad news when you're using power tools for 8 hours a day). I really like Dilaudid because it's the only one that doesn't give me any side effects. I'm able to take 4mg of Dilaudid about every 3 hours while I'm working and I don't have to be worried about using power tools or driving. My head stays perfectly clear. Problem is, even the heaviest hitting drugs (which Dilaudid is) don't take the pain away. All they do is take the edge off.

The injections are nothing at all to be concerned about. I've been getting the injections about once every 2 months for the last 3 years now. They give them to me in either the facet joint or the disc itself. Sometimes they'll even do both. The injections only help me a little though. I basically go get an injection when it gets to the point where I can't stand at all.

I went through the physical therapy, acupuncture, chiropractors, etc. None of that did anything at all for me. The therapy actually makes me feel ten times worse. Fortunately, I'm scheduled for a microdisectomy on December 6th. I've tried everything else, so surgery is the only thing left. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Good luck with your back. Only advise I can offer you is to avoid walking on concrete floors as much as possible. I'm at the point where I'd rather have someone hit me in the head with a baseball bat than to walk on concrete. The shock runs right up my leg and into my back with every step I take. One good thing about the pain though, you do kind of get used to it. Or at least your pain tolerance increases. My back is the worst its ever been right now, but since I've been dealing with it for so long, I almost never miss any work because of it. When it all first started, I used to miss work all the time because the pain would blow me away. It still hurts extremely bad, but I just learned how to cope with it.

 

[sw1211]

Thanks everyone for taking the time to post comments.  Lou, luckily my pain isn't at your level.(yet)  Good luck with your surgery.  The 6th is the day I'm currently scheduled for an injection, must be bad back day.

 

[Lou Miller]

Thanks everyone for taking the time to post comments.  Lou, luckily my pain isn't at your level.(yet)  Good luck with your surgery.  The 6th is the day I'm currently scheduled for an injection, must be bad back day.

Are you going to a doctor that puts you under anesthesia for the shot, or one that just gives a local? I went to one of those doctors that actually put you under in the beginning. I saw all the people walking around in the back like they were half dead after they came to. I said screw that, just give me the darn needle and be done with it. After some protesting from the doctors, (they want the extra money) they did, and it was nothing, just a little pinch. They now just give me two shots to numb the area before the big needle goes in. I don't feel any of them. I think a lot of people make way more out of the injections than is needed. Trust me, there's nothing to worry about. The worst that'll happen to you is that the shot just won't do anything to relieve your pain. The upside is that it could do a whole lot for your pain. Some people get a lot of relief from the shots.

 

[sw1211]

They said it's a conscious sedation, so I don't think I'll be all the way out.  Since it's the 1st time having someone stick a needle in my back I think I'd prefer to be a bit more out of it.

 

[Michael Kellough]

Sorry to hear about the back problems you guys are having, I know a bit about that from a sudden herniated disk (L5) about ten years ago which resulted in pretty bad sciatica.

The only physical therapy that had a direct positive effect for me was traction. I came close to building my own machine because insurance would only cover one treatment a week. Cortisone however is the real deal for most people and really reduces the pain for weeks if not months like Matthew said. I got three injections. If I remember correctly that is all the doctor would allow in a year. I botched the first one because I felt so much better that I got too active and apparently extruded some more goo out of the disk.

Some people with disk problems can't sit and some can't walk. I couldn't walk from the car to the mall without a lot of pain so I started using crutches and got around pretty fast with them. I was lucky to find out that an Aeron chair could be adjusted so that I could sit in it all day and be pretty much pain free. If I was in pain from walking I could get into the chair and it would calm down fast. I was especially lucky to get a call from someone who needed me to do CAD and other computer visualization work. Still, it was a huge drag to not be able to walk much and I started researching surgical options.

I settled on the technique that uses a hot wire to vaporize some of the disk goo so that it shrinks and reduces the pressure on the nerve. It seemed to have the least risk of the surgical options but the risks where still significant and the consequences of a bad outcome very serious. In my reading about back problems I came across a statistic that made me really think. Four years after seeking treatment the same number of people who chose surgery still have bad symptoms as people who didn't choose surgery. This can be sliced into a lot of different scenarios but it made me think that if I could get by without surgery there was a good chance my back might heal on it's own with little or no adverse consequences. Also, my wife was very fearful of the surgery options.

At the same she was also studying Tai Chi and learning about pressure points and acupressure which is basically the same physiological concept behind acupuncture. She explained all that stuff to me and started giving me acupressure treatments and they did sometimes have a good effect. One time she found a combination of pressure points that created such an unexpected and positive sensation that I became convinced that there was something real in this old Chinese practice and she was able to convince me to give acupuncture treatments a try before going for surgery.

When I went to my first acupuncture treatment I'd been on crutches for about a year and I estimated that the bad symptom's had diminished about 10% over that year. I went for acupuncture with moxibustion once a week for about ten weeks but no single acupressure treatment had much effect on the actual pain. At best, the combination of acupressure and relaxing on my side for a half hour brought the pain back to point it was at before I aggravated it by traveling to the clinic for the treatment. So, from the point of view of the immediate relief of physical pain the acupressure was a wash. But, I really think there was a truly profound beneficial effect. The fifth time I went to the clinic without the crutches and never used them again. After the sixth treatment I figured that the symptoms had diminished about 30%. But that wasn't the only improvement I'd noticed. For some reason my sense of smell (which had become suppressed during the past year) clearly got better as the acupressure treatments continued. My mood and energy level did too but just seems like an obvious accompaniment to a reduction of pain. By the tenth treatment they'd diminished about 75% and that was plenty good enough for me since insurance didn't pay for them. I continued to heal and the only symptoms I have now a a very slight numbness of my middle toes on my left foot. I rarely even recall that I had sciatica, but that may be a symptom of something else.  I hope you guys recover as well and quickly. Good luck!

 

[Daviddubya]

Seeking medical advice on a woodworking forum?  Hmmm.  I understand something about back problems, having had some myself, and I am sorry that you are having difficulty.  But... I would encourage you to seek your medical alternatives from qualified medical professionals.  Opinions are like certain a body part - everyone has one.

 

[Eli]

Since my disk is in my neck, and I'm still on the youngish side, there isn't too many surgical options. They could fuse the  vertebrae, but that would obviously wear the ones above and below, which they will have to treat the same, and eventually gives a new meaning to the term "Stiff back".

I could get an artificial disk put in, but the last I checked, none of them really lasted for any distance or were a very good option, according to the neurosurgeon I saw. I guess I'm also just changing my pain thresholds like Lou. I'm very careful about work, I try to keep the stress down, and fight it with massage mostly. I can't stress how important changing the shoes is, it made a huge difference for me.

The other thing that immediately ruled out surgery for me is the fact that they go in through the front of your neck. I'm no chicken, I don't mind needles, being cut, going under, getting shots, any of that. But moving my windpipe aside is not an acceptable option for me.

Moxibustion is the cupping with shot glasses?

 

[Tinker]

When i was 2 yrs old, i fell off of a playgrond slide and landed on my head.  That explains a whole lot of problems that we won't discuss here  :  I have been going to chiropractors since i was around 4yrs old.  I started working around cattle at age 9 and tried, even then, to keep up with the men around me, heavy lifting, heavy lifting, and more heavy lifting.  From about the time i was 9, I did not go to another chiropractor until a year or two after i got out of the army.  By that time, i was doing mason work, and starting my own business.  I had injured myself while in the service and once i got back into the heavy lifting, I started having serious back pains.  I soon found out that one leg was shorter than the other and a lift in the heel of my right shoe helped for a few years. 

From time I was 25 until around early 40's , i went to many different chiropractors, asking each one what I could do for myself.  each one basically recommended time off from work and weekly treatments.  the last one in that string of chiropractors decided to make my short leg longer by pulling HARD on the ankle with each session.  After about 6 months of that, i fell while walking down the street.  It felt like my hip had come out of the socket.  i swore off of chiropractors.

about a year or so later, my back went out again, but i kept working, eventually to the point i was crawling on my hands & knees to meet my contracts.  At that point, i was getting all sorts of advice from religius to everything you guys have been talking about above.  finally, while running my backhoe, i discovered my legs would not work.  i managed to crawl off my machine and got to my truck.  i chinned myself a few times on the door and was able to drive home.  I knew of a chiropractor near by i had never been to, but several of my "advisors" had recommented him.  i got in right away and actually had to crawl in to his office.  I spent an hour with him while he x-rayed and discussed (after reading the X-rays).  i was told i was withing a mm or two of never walking again.  I had looked at the pics and mentioned surgery as option.  He knew of several surgeons who would be glad to operate.  Once i went to them, i could never come back to him.  If he could not help me, i could go to a surgeon.  As with others above, i did not care for the option of surgery and told him to get to work.  I walked out of his office that day and have been going to him ever since. 

Recently, medicare refused to pay for my treatments, refused to allow treatment and so i had MRI.  They refused payment again and told the MRI people not to bill me.  When we looked at the MRI, I was told it is a miracle i can even stand up, let alone walk, and i am still working 5 to 7 days a week.  Having gone to back surgeon, who straightened things out with Medicare, i am still not attempting the surgery route.  When i can't walk, or my chiropractor retires, i will think of other options.

One thing i liked about my present chiropractor is that right from the very start, some 28 years ago, he gave me a list of 4 exercises to do for my body.  he gave me a booklet that showed hundreds of exercises.  he went thru the book page by page to cross out those exercises i should never do.  He showed the ones i could do and the ones i should do every day.  The main point of this paragraph is to point out that there are things one should do and the things one should not do under any circumstances.  Me, i won't go for surgery and i will not take pain killers of any kind.  That won't work for everybody.  What works for me won't work for every body.  There have been times when the pains were unbearable in my back, legs and feet.  I definitely sympathize with you who are afflicted and sympathize with the struggles you are having trying to decide what path to take for relief.  I agree with David that a woodworking site is not the place to go for advice.  If you have taken the time to read this post, you should most certainly not follow the exact same path as I have.  Each sufferer must do their own reserch and proceed with the direction he/she is most comfortable with and to take the advice of the experts in whichever direction you decide upon.

Note:  A very dear friend of mine has his own deffinition of Expert.
An EX is a has been.  A SPERT is a drip under pressure  8)
Tinker

 

[Corwin]

I guess I am in good company...  Currently, my situation is rather bad in that I cannot sit in some chairs or lay in bed at all without experiencing sudden jolts.  Very hard getting to sleep.  Wife's begging me to go get checked out.  I've had problems with my neck for over twenty years but recently things became much worse when I wrenched my back moving furniture.  Well, that was just before July 4th and my symptoms started about two weeks later.  This is getting old.

So, I guess you could say, "we feel your pain."  Hope you can get some relief.

Corwin

 

[Lou Miller]

Seeking medical advice on a woodworking forum?  Hmmm.  I understand something about back problems, having had some myself, and I am sorry that you are having difficulty.  But... I would encourage you to seek your medical alternatives from qualified medical professionals.  Opinions are like certain a body part - everyone has one.

I don't think anyone is giving him medical advice really. More so, we're just sharing our experiences with him.  Hearing what others went through with similar problems to mine was a huge help to me.

 

[Eli]

Yep, just sharing, not advising. Mine problem really started when I came off my surfboard in Nicaragua and landed head first in two feet of water. Felt like somebody teed off my head with a sledge for a croquet mallet.

 

[Michael Kellough]

...Moxibustion is the cupping with shot glasses?

Moxibustion is adding some kind of smoldering fibrous herb to certain acupuncture needles. I don't remember the explanation, it was just part of what was prescribed by the practitioner and I was fully ready to give it a chance. Whether it "worked", or my condition was just coincidentally ready to heal, I can't be certain, but I think it helped at least.

 

[sw1211]

The other thing that immediately ruled out surgery for me is the fact that they go in through the front of your neck. I'm no chicken, I don't mind needles, being cut, going under, getting shots, any of that. But moving my windpipe aside is not an acceptable option for me.

A guy I worked with had the neck surgery where they went through the front a couple of years ago.  He was in his early 30's and was at the point where he couldn't turn his head, sleep in a bed, etc.  The surgery went great, full recovery with no complications.

 

[Dan Clark]

Steve,

Welcome to the FOG. 

I'm sorry to hear about your back problems.    Like a lot of the other folks here, I can relate.  I've had back and joint problems for about 45 years.  Ain't fun!  In my case a lot of it comes from inactivity.  If I get at least 15 minutes on the treadmill each day, it helps me a lot.  It also turns out that my wife started having sciatic pain in the last 6 months.  I think it's catching. 

Best of luck,

Dan.

 

[Tinker]

Yep, just sharing, not advising. Mine problem really started when I came off my surfboard in Nicaragua and landed head first in two feet of water. Felt like somebody teed off my head with a sledge for a croquet mallet.

Altho back pain is really no joke, I do have some funny experiences with my own problem.  One (about racing a girls soccer team), i have already related elsewhere.

For me, i have always, and continue to, done heavy lifting. It has been a necessary part of my job.  Nobody ever told me what vocational interrests to follow.  i made my choices and went there. My choices have certainly contributed to my ongoing problems.  there have been many times when i have been afraid to move my feet to put them onto the floor in the morning.  i have had to lie there and actually visualize my plan for doing so.  There have been times when i have helped move pianos and lifted and carried my end with no immediate serious effect.  There have been times when i put myself totally out of commission while such a simple task as tieing my shoes.  That has happened so often thru the years that I have, for over twenty five years now, layed on my back to put my shoes & socks on in the morning.  For those of you wwho are afflicted with this type of problem, that would be the only advise I would give.  It really helps as you are allowing your own body to give support.

Anyhow, i had been going every day, then every other day, and was finally down to one per week for my "adjustments" for a very sore neck .  this was something new to me, as i have my serious problems in the lower back. (S1/L5/l4/L3/L2L1).  The neck pain has always been the most scary to me.  I never seem to have a clue as to how it happened. (My dearly beloved tells me it probably happened when I was watching some pretty lady walking past.  now, i have no idea where she ever comes up with ideas like that.  Oh well, i love her anyhow.)  The other is that I cannot seem tobe able to support my head.  When i get up from my bed, or lie down, I must take both hands and actually support my head.  I have absolutely no strength in my neck and it is unbelievably painful.

I still kept going to work everyday, no matter how much pain.  i just applied the neck brace and went.  This one day, i had just left my chiroprctor's office and headed for my next job.  I had to mow a new lawn that i had never been on before.  My neck, even after the adjustment was still quite scary sore.  I no longer use a walk-behind mower, but stick to the riders.  A lot more fun  ;D

One of the riders goes forward/backward only if you are applying pressure to the control levers.  The other you set a lever for forward motion.  The two hand control levers you use to slow down, stop or go into reverse.  If you have the drive lever applied, you just have to hang on and adjust direction by applying backwards pressure to one, or both, of the hand levers.  That machine only moves about 8 mph.  The one i usually operate is safer, but can mow up to 10mph.  now, 8mph and 10mph may not seem very fast to somebody who has no knowledge of mowing equipment or tractors.  Believe me, it is pretty fast, especialy under conditions i am about to relate.

The first SOP (Standard Operating Proceedure)was to do the trim cut around the perimeter of the lawn and around the house.  I had done the outer edges and than moved to go around the house.  there were flower and shrub beds with an ocassional small tree, mostly dogwoods.  the dogwood tree has branching quite low and more horizontal the verticle in growth habit.  I was flying along at probably half speed as i was working my way along the irregular edges of the beds.  Not a care in the world beyond a still very sore neck.  Suddenly, WHAM!!!

The top of my head hurt.  My glasses went flying (this was in the days before i got rid of my "cadilacs".  Today, since that operation, i no longer need them except for reading.)  As for my nech, I had actually heard and felt the vertibre cruncxhing and/or sliding together.  I had come into contact with one of those pesky dogwood limbs.  Instinctively, i had managed to yank back on the controls and I came to a sudden halt.  However, the damage had been done and my head was lying bak at a rediculous angle, even if my neck had been healthy.  What was especially frightening to me was that there was no pain in my neck.  My arms and legs did not feel any pain.  i just felt as nearly normal as, perhaps, any normal crazy idiot could feel.  But I was quite aprehentious.  I dared not let go of the controls and i dared not move. As I sat there, motionless, I settled myself down and began thinking and planning out my next moves and tried to figure how to shut down the mower without letting go of my deathgrip on the handles.  i finally ventured to try to move my feet, one foot at a time.  My toes wiggled.  My foot could move where I told it to go.  finally, a leg, or two, moved.  I was getting real brave, so I allowed the relaxing of a little attention to the two control levers.  the mower moved.  i pulled back slightly. the mower stopped.  still no pain.  i moved my body.  no pain.  i thought for a moment or two and finally, i allowed the mower to move ahead, under my control.  i made a couple of turns and finally drove out to my truck.  I then shut off the machine and, real adventurously, attempted to get off the machine.  WOW!  As Eddie Murphy would have said, "It's a myrical. I can walk!!!"  From that point on, no more pain in my neck.  i may have been a pain in the neck to somebody, but i no longer had a pain on ME.

Two weeks later, I went back for what was to be my final adjustment for the problem.  As i lay there on Dr. Jim's table, i told him i would probably no longer need his assistance in the future.  i related my storty to him, telling him i had stepped up the technology of body repair by many years.  "How big was that limb?"

"Oh about 3 or 3-1/2 inches in diameter."

"you know, it is really much better to have professional help in these matters.  From now on, i will keep a 2x4 in the corner, just for you."

Now, Eli, you are the one with neck problems.  Why don't you try my method?  :

Tinker

 

[Eli]

But the key is you didn't know it was there. If I start looking around for dogwood trees, I'll ruin the surprise! ;D