[Dutchman working in France]

Thanks for the welcome, Trace.

I'm actually in a lot of pain but try to be upbeat nonetheless :-). I have been living with backpain and/or chronic sciatic pain for 20 years already.

Yes, I'm a lumbar spiney, L5/S1 to be exact.

My (medical) history:

In 1987, when I was 26, my back problems started. I did a lot of sports: tennis, badminton, squash, volleyball, etc. Somehow I ruptured my inter vertebral disk at L5/S1 in that year.

Sharp, intense and radiating pain in my left leg whenever I sat down, when I carried heavy things, etc. The pain always started in the left buttock, then radiated into the left posterior thigh, never in the calf, but sometimes also in the left foot. I visited lots of docters and specialists, followed every treatment program known in the Netherlands at that time but nothing helped.

Then one day my left leg suddenly was paralysed. Rushed to the hospital, they opened me up, going in through the back and the surgeon found the L5/S1 intervertebral disk in fragments, all the "gel" leaked out, and the nerve roots heavily inflamed/irritated. He cleaned the disk out, and closed me up. Then a long period of recovery started (but more in a "roller coaster" than "linear" way).
Meanwhile I finished university, found a job, and slowly things got better. Every once in a while I had sciatica pain but it usually went away with bed rest. I worked for ten years and then, in 1997, at 36 years old, the sciatic nerve pain returned in full force, and before long I couldn't sit on a chair anymore, couldn't drive a car anymore, etc. In December 1997 a second back surgery is decided upon: again going in through the back, this time they remove some bone above and below the nerve root to give the nerves more room; the L5/S1 disk is pretty degenerated and thin. This second surgery was a failure and relieved none of my pain. I went elsewhere to get other medical opinions but in the Netherlands at that time, the only remaining option was fusion of L5 to S1 with cages and pedicles. I researched it, didn't like what I found and decided to try to live with the pain.

I quit my job and in 1999 I moved with my partner to France when she got offered a job there. Ever so slowly my back improved; to the point that in 2001 I decided to start working again, for a French IT-company. This also means that I now payed taxes in France, and had my own "Carte Vitale", meaning that I was covered by the French Social Security system.

Unfortunately, the IT company went bankrupt in 2004. In that IT job I had been doing a lot of travelling, and that was slowly degrading my back again. Once unemployed I decided to do
something totally different: selling real-estate, the thought being that I could then work as little or as much as I want, since the real estate agency only pays me a commission on each sale, no salary, so I could work totally independent, where and when I wanted. Went quite well, for a while too. But then in the beginning of this year (2007), we moved house and (stupid, I know) I overdid it it and OUCH: the pain was there again: let's say 9 on a scale of 10. Long story short... after months of trying to avoid it, "a third back surgery" became an option again, since living in this much pain was getting harder and harder. The pain started waking me up at night too...

This was to be my first major experience with the French medical system. You need a referral from your GP, "medecin generale" but you can choose your own "specialist" or surgeon. I asked around and was given the same two names several times. I made appointments with both of them and immediately liked one and disliked the other.

I take a short break here because I just read somewhere that it is illegal in France to comment on medical professionals or even put names and contact details of medical personnel on a public forum.

Does anyone know what's up with that?