OT: low pack, nerve pain and cortison injection?

back is messed up, have some pinched nerves down
there and disk issues, initial doc recommended a
cortisone injection to help with the swelling
around the nerve and for the pain until I can get
in to see the bask specialist at the orthopedics
center, which is not until mid January as they are
booked up. . Any one have any experience to share
or advice. Need to be able to function and do my
chores. Damn back sent me to ER on the 19th, sure
takes foreverr to get into a specialist these days

It is a bridge to real intervention. It might feel radically better do not even think of acting like it fixed things. do not do what you could not do before! The issue is that the pain is moderated the damage is still there. Just don't do what you feel good enough to do. It is a false sense of capacity. Jim (several relatives have gone way down hill from the stressing of joints and back after injection, but before repair).

I have had two back surgery on L4 & L5 years ago. I reruptured both disks five years after surgery. They then went in and did the cortisone shots on both of them. I had to have shots twice in each disk. The last shots was in 1993 and so far so good but was told if I ruptured them again it would be fusion with stainlees steel rod. Back when they gave me shots I was told I could only have three shots a year because they were hard on your stomach. I still have some trouble from time to time with the muscles that they cut for surgery.

I have sciatica. Have had it all my life due to a slipped disc.
The pain had always been in my hip; but about a year ago something happened and the pain shot down my right leg making my foot numb.
I tried inversion tables and all sorts of remedy's.
While I was scared I was all set to get a cortisone injection when a doctor ask if I was willing to try a pill instead just to see if it might help.
I said yes if it means I may get by without the cortisone injection.
He gave me Gabapentin. You have to ease into it as the does may be high; but after a couple of weeks the pain was gone.
I quit the pills after a couple of months and just take them on flare ups now.

I spent three days on the floor, last FEB. because of my back. I recently have been trying to sleep on my back and it is giving me some relief. Relief is a trial and error experiment and of course it takes allot of time to figure out what will or won't work. I was on my back and turned my head to the right and within seconds, got pain in the left side of my lower back. I turned my head to the left and the pain went away within 5 seconds.

Jim is DEAD ON with his advise(as usual). I read an article about Ex-NFL players who have destroyed body parts because the pain killers aloud them to continue playing thru the pain.
Good luck
SDE

the shots will help reduce swelling on the nerves but do not fix the damage. that means you get the pain relief, or some pain relief... but again, they dont fix the bad disc... what does that mean?

well in my case, I do very well now, but dont pick up heavy objects any more. As everytime I do, its back to the pain and shots...

So taken correctly, yes for the pain relief.. a fix for bad back, no...

you decide, but you will never be a young buck again picking up engine blocks... with or without surgery. If you want the nerve pain to subside a bit...go for it. easy procedure.. quick and seems to work very well for all but the most critical injuries. Does take a couple of days to work. Can keep you off heavy duty goofy pills, and back to walking around again.

FIRST thing to do is find a VERY GOOD Dr who 's job is only to give Epidurals...
If he needs to use a scanner to do it, he is not what you want.
The one I finally found (Dr Reddy at Neurological Assoc. in Cols, Oh,) does it entirely by FEEL, nearly always pain-free and it takes about 30 minutes from hobble-in to walk out.
After a few years though, scar tissue accumulates at the site and the shots stop working.
That was when I found Dr. Gladstone McDowell at St Judes Hospital..
He is a Professional Pain Specialist who does all his own Surgeries.
He put a Neuromodulation device in my back that controls my lower back pain over 90% and often 100%.
It is a small (internal) device inside my left "love handle" that I can charge with an external Pad, with 2 leads that he implants along-side your Spinal Chord. The mice-tensing makes a Magnetic field that does not allow the Pain signals to pass to your brain..!
He has put these in all types of patients..even terminally ill patients.
He is able to use this to control chronic pain even in a knee or wrist..
I LIKE his philosophy..."You have Many options, before you have to Submit to a Knife"...!!
I advise you to check with him if you have life-changing Pain...
After 10 years of hardly getting around with a Cane and writhing in pain when I had to stop, I have been able to take Western Square Dancing again, with no problems with pain, NO numbness in my rt leg and Foot and the feeling of a BROKEN Hip all GONE...
Only stipulation is, for 6 WEEKS, you can NOT Bend, Twist of FALL, or you will dis-place the leads...but worth every minute..!
Ron.

That gabapentin is the same stuff I've been taking for a couple months (rt leg goes numb followed by left shortly after) but I'm not seeing much if any improvement.

I had a cortisone shot in each hip that did absolutely nothing. I might of just took a drink of water. 2 weeks ago they tried botox. 4 shots in each leg & so far it did nothing but make me feel sleepy the 1st week or so.

I've had lower back and pains in just about every other joint from time to time. What I get PO'd about is that every specialist I've gone to over the years has diagnosed each one correctly only about 50% of the time. That's a coin toss. You would think with 10 years or more of formal education they would have better odds than that. All the mechanics I've been to have a much higher batting average with my vehicles. (BTW they never did find the back issue and about a year later it just healed on its own. Maybe I should have asked my mechanic)

save the time and money and find a good surgeon , I went for 25 yrs. before I wised up...feel great now that they took out 2 discs...those shots never did anything for me...

The cortisone shots kept my knees going for about 5 years before I needed replacements. However, every time (3 months apart) my sugar went sky-high and would have be on insulin for a week. I used to go for my back but quit because of the sugar and it didn"t help that much. Also the copay almost doubled to $55.

I have good results with Gabapentin which was given to me to help with numbness I have from my body not being able to product vitamin B 12. I take three capsules a day and it helps a lot with numbness.

What strengh of Gabapentin are you taking ? I take the lower dose of it for my numbness and doctor said if it didn't work he could go to a stronger does.

Bernie do you know that if you take cortisone shots long enough you will become a full blown diabetic. Cortisone shots are also hard on yor stomach.

I went in (painful arthritis in my hip) and the specialist put me under a fluoroscope and shot some dye to use for some kind of reference and then injected some sort of steroid and it was magical! No pain whatsoever. He said it should be good for at least 2 to 4 months. I worked like a young man going up and down ladders, dragging things around, etc for 2 1/2 weeks. Then the pain came back. I way overdid and it caught up to me. You're right, Jim.

100mg 3 times a day for a month, then 300mg 3 times/day, hasn't done much if any good so far.

I take 300mg 3 times a day
Doctor told me I could go up over 2000mg a day if the lower dose did not work.

This pill may not be for you but it sure works for me.

Teddy, it's the same thing for me. Had cortisone in the back and knee and it didn't do anything both places. Marilyn got the shots in her knuckles and it did help but the shots were enough to send her through the ceiling. Jim