Biacuplasty, revisited

[ERvet]

Rich: I'm currently 4.5 hours since the second bilateral transforaminal ESI, L5. Lidocaine has worn off, I'm watching the MJ memorial, and gonna go to the movies this afternoon. That's what's next! I'm just hoping to get longer term relief, if the last one was any indication that this could actually give some longer term relief. We shall see....

Susan

[ERvet]

Charles:
had that done once, on the right, nuking L5 and S1-3 (I have an intra-op fluoro photo of the needles in place....pretty cool). It did give relief, not complete, however, but it lasted about 6 weeks. That was before the left side started bothering me. I found it absolutely fascinating that THIS ESI, done at a slightly different location/approach, gave me 100% relief on both sides, for 6 weeks (100%) before creeping back (to a level of relief of about 40%) today. It was truly unbelievable to me, having had so many prior ESIs that did next to nothing after the local wore off. Why the difference? I don't know. I'm pretty sure my pain generator was identified with the discogram....as the L5-S1 disc, though L4-5 was not happy. The new pain on the left has not been identified. Maybe it's from the L4-5 disc, given the pain distribution on the left. Who knows? Blue Cross won't approve one lumbar ADR, they certainly won't consider two. So I'm counting on my new pain guy to make it more tolerable, and lead to few colorful metaphors.

Susan