Rhizotomy or other new tretments

[Melisa]

Hi all,

Has any one, with cervicale damage/injury experienced a Rhizotomy procedure on the last few years and can share the experience ?

Is there any new procedure/ treatment that is in a process ? any hope for such a tretment ?

Melissa

[janaya3]

Originally Posted by Melisa

Hi all,

Has any one, with cervicale damage/injury experienced a Rhizotomy procedure on the last few years and can share the experience ?

Is there any new procedure/ treatment that is in a process ? any hope for such a tretment ?

Melissa

Melissa,

I am not a cervical patient but did have several rhizotomy procedures done last year prior to my lumbar surgery. I had what is know as Water Cooled Radio Frequency (WCRF) Nerve Ablation which is the latest, I think. You are generally under anesthesia and probes are inserted via flouroscopy guided technique at the troubled level, in this case the facet joints, as well as the levels above and below. In my case my L4-5 disc was problematic and MD thought my facet joints were contributing to my pain so I had the procedure done from L3-S1. The WCRF targets the facet joint and eliminates pain transmission generated by the degenarative changes of the facet joints. WCRF Nerve Ablation is thought to provide larger lesion areas compared to the non-WCRF and also thought to prevent damage to other surrounding tissues/structures vs the traditional radiofrequency ablation process/method most commonly used. The nerves around the facet joints are basically super heated and ablated (destroyed). It is pretty much a facet joint injection but without the meds (corticosteroid) so you may flare up but its effects last much longer. The nerve ending are basically destroyed and since it takes a long time for regenaration of the nerve ending you don't have to undergo the procedure as often as a facet joint injection with a corticosteriod.

The procedure itself takes no more than about 5-10 minutes per level and this includes potentially targeting both sides or facets and it was all done in about 30-40 minutes. The biggest time consumer of the procedure is the preparatory phase associated with it becasue the location where I had it done treated it like as if I were having an outpatient same day surgery procedure. You meet with an anesthesiologist and your MD they wheel you into the OR room and finally to a recovery room. I felt some ache and tenderness the following morning and had these symptoms for several weeks or approximately 13 days, if I remember correctly. I was given pain meds but didn't take them as it really didn't bother me a whole lot during the first procedure. I had the procedure done because the MD thought I might have had a satisfactory result from a previous trial of facet joint injections but I had also had an epidural shot a month or so prior to it. He still thought I might have had facet joint like symptoms none the less. However a second round of rhizotomy proved incorrect. I had a second rhizotomy procedure done about 8 months apart from the first because it felt like my condition was getting worse but the rhizotomy did nothing and more or less seemed to have aggravate my discogenic pain for some reason or other. I think by this time though my degenarative disc was so severly dessicated and I had lost disc space that I was feeling more of the discogenic pain.

You can google or search the forum for rhizotomy, radiofrequency nerve ablation or WCRF Nerve Ablation and see what else is out there.

I hope this answers your question if not let me know.