is a very effective nerve medication. I started out with 300mg dosage per day and currently I am using 2000mg a day.
It has been effective in allowing me to reduce narcotic pain medications and I believe it was one of major factors in allowing me to eliminate Oxycontin.
I've been taking this for about 6 months and have seen zero negative side effects

I was told the same thing, but I know i have a high tolerance for pain and that something more was wrong. Kept pushing and saw new doc and had mri done and what do you know herniation at t6-t7 impinging on spinal cord among other things. The results can depend on the doctor reading films, the strength of the mri machine, some people not me saw new problems when they had a sitting mri done weaker coil though. I sound like a broken record and I have said this before, i was told my back pain and hip pain was in my head after those mri's ( one on hip came back neg). Two years down the line I was right, back pain diag. from herniation and found another doc for hip, told him my symptoms mimic torn labrum, he said its rare ,but worth a shot and did a contrasted mri. I was right had surgury 10 days later and pain free (hip) ever since. The doc said he was one of only 2 docs in Houston, TX doing that surgury. I by no means think I am smarter than a doc but I know me better than anyone and I did some reasearch and found things that patterned my symptoms and found a good doctor whos ego did not prevent him from listening to the person whos body it is. Even if I would have been wrong and he said theres no way i would have felt better like i was getting somewhere and thats what a good doctor does. Sorry so long but i get mad at this 2 years I suffered in pain for what amounted to 45 min surgury, no rehab and fully functional in 10 days.( talking about hip, back is another issue)

Have you looked into CMP? Your muscles on either side of your spine might have CMP trigger points (which feels like knots in the muscles.) They can feel small like a pea, or large like a marble. Here is the best website I have found on the matter. http://www.sover.net/~devstar/define.htm

Welcome to Spine Health. I like your username, obviously someone that likes birds.

I hope you have some time to go to the intro section and introduce yourself so we can all get to know you a little bit better.

Always feel free to PM our moderators, Ron, Paul, Bruce and Miki.

"C"

Do not accept that answer.You know your body and if you are in pain there is a reason for it. Last year from the first of november til January 9th this year I was on a walker. I have had back trouble for years and had already had one back surgery prior to this incident. My left leg started bothering me and got worse and worse as the time went by. they did m.r.i's, myleograms, all kind of test and said there was nothing showing that could cause this kind of pain. I didn't go back to my original surgeon because He is out of town so the one that I went to here in my home town offered me the advice that in the old days people went to bed with this kind of pain and that in a few months it could get better. I had already suffered for 2 months!!! I decided to go back to the surgeon who did my first surgery. I am so glad I did. He did exploratory surgery and found the problem. I had a bone spur that was like a bent knuckle hiding under the main nerve root making it where it wouldn't show on x-rays or mri's. it had the nerve root bent up causing my pain. he drilled that spur down and lay the nerve back down. instant relief when i awoke from surgery. You just have to find the right doctor. I am just 2 days out of the hospital from my 3rd back surgery in 4 years. This one was for a ruptured disc L/4 L/5. I wish you luck and hope that you can find someone to find the problem.

Royce4142.

Welcome, I'm sorry you are getting treated this way. I had to go through many doctors before I found my wonderful NS and PM team!

My thoracic pain is a combination of overextending those muscles because of lumbar problems and esophageal issues. So when you wrote sharp pains in every breath can you describe it better. Mine is like locking air in my sternum area and so the swelling and inflammation carries over to the upper back as well. I'm still having more test to evaluate this symptom and others, also lesion at T4 growing.

So, could you have upper gastrological problems and not know it? Do you have history of arthritis? Was your MRI done with contrast? I'm not a doctor, just throwing different ideas for you to research.

What it all comes down to is finding a good doctor that is knowledgeable and willing to work with you. They are out there, just hard to find. What state do you live in?

Take care and keep us updated if you can.
O-

I have a chipped disc pinching the nerve controlling my right arm, a herniated disc between L-4 and L-5 and something going on in my thoracic spine that is UNBEARABLE. I have vertebra popping out slightly, pain, pressure, and the worst pain I have ever experienced. I FINALLY convinced my pain management Dr. to MRI my thoracic spine and he called me today to tell me he found a "few abnormailities" but nothing that would cause as much pain as I have been having. I cried and cried....this was my worse nightmare. I am on so may pain meds that controls everything from the burning in my body, the other discs, but not this....I know in my heart this is serious but now I have a Dr. who is giving me second thoughts. I cannot work the pain is so bad, and have Medicaid so I don't have much of a choice (on Docs that is). I read the story about the bent knuckle hiding under the main nerve root. It sounds similar to what I am experiencing ...How does a 22 year old convince these limited Dr's that there is something serious going on....This has taken over my life. I cannot go to school, care for my daughter and am on so many meds my Dr. is almost mad at ME about it.This is unreal. I don't really have the money to go to Dr. to Dr. But I'm glad I am not alone :{

I know how you feel, for almost 2 years i have had lower back pain, inner right thigh pain, sciatica, some times pain across my stomach right side and a gland down there that gets iritated. This happens when ever i lift something and reach, sit on something to hard, to soft, for to long, sit and lift, all little things that arch my back, backwards. I got an MRI done and it showed buldging L4/L5 after struggling for a year being diagnosed, swimming 1k everything morning, walking an hour every day and physio i had enough and went to a neuro specialist, he told me my MRI dosnt match my symptoms.

I am so sick of being pain and having nothing done about it, the doctors spend about 5 mins talking and your out the door and you get charged 50 buks a time, i cant afford to keep going back and not getting any help.

I now have to go back for another MRI on my spine incase anything has changed...

No one can explain the iriated gland either, been to gynos and there is nothing wrong...i know it get iriated every time i hurt my back though...so strange.

Royce4142......I totally feel for you. I am in a similiar situation. I had a L5-S1 microdisectomy 4 years ago and 8 months after the surgery I started to have radiating pain down my leg and severe lower back pain. I have just had an mri done and my worst nightmare has come true....the mri doesn't show much except that the l5-s1 disc is markedly narrowed and minimal scar tissue present. You are not alone....i also feel as if the doctors think I am a drug seeker. Very discouraging....I hope things start to get better for you. Take care.

what your spinal problem may be. And the interpretation of the MRI reports and images can be seen differently by two different doctors.

In the situations when it is clear cut and a herniation or other problem is so large, then MRI's are fine.

It is amazing to hear how many people on this site talk about their doctor's view of their MRI as not being bad, but yet they are in alot of severe pain.

In those situations, I would just ask the doctor to explain why you are having that much pain. And if you do not get a reasonable answer, then ask if there are other tests that could be done. Never insist or even suggest a specific test. Let the doctor come up with that.

After all of that and you still are not satisfied, perhaps look for another doctor. And after all that is done and there is still no answers for your pain, you might need to seek out other help to better understand why you are feeling the pain

To Royce4142

My medical history echoes all those above who've been told they're 'fine' or they're 'fabricating it' or they must be 'imagining it', accompanied by that cynical look, which you know is tacitly impyling ------- drugseeker.

Whenever humans are involved, mistakes can be made.

hello, i am new to this forum. not to spine surgery, i had a mri last year with nothing significant. now my fingers and legs are numb and tingly. i'm on lyrica 75mg 3x day. it really don't help much. i was on nuerontin 900mg day that didn't help. don't want pain meds. like opiates, those really damage my soul and mind. i almost died from them. so do i need another mri or just accept that i have nueropathy and thats th way it is?

In 86 I rolled a car, ejected onto freeway at 60+ mph. Collapsed t5t6 and then 4 stable fractures as well as a laundry list of other injuries. All I was treated for was with braces, 3 weeks in a bed and lots of stitches to my head and years later, knee surgery. The MRIs the bone spect scans, every modality known or suggested. The exrays are brutal. Naturally I always believed the growing chronic pain must have come from the obvious trauma to that area, I've never been so frustrated at the swiftness at which I was dismissed as inoperable. Today is day 6 since the fusion of C-6 c-7 and read that again, NO sign of trauma there. Finally a dr said enough with focusing on the t spine and he ordered mri's of c spine. Pain is so much relieved now, though t spinecis still a mess. Pop, snap, etc. He found time coupled with spures was inflaming a nerve that he could see once he opened me up like a pez dispenser. All I can say is there are reasons I dare not question, he was right and I have at 42 another option, another chance to live. I was at the end of my rope, in more ways than one. My GP has me on so much narcotics long term that they couldn't even control post op agony as I was needing drugs that had me on the cusp of respiratory failure. I now feel as if a daemon was removed. Point being, in part anyway, if they dismiss you, keep looking till you find the answer in a professional that isn't about treating only the sure thing. I've gotten more customer service at Mc Donalds than from some doctors. Living on an island only made it more challenging in terms of finding treatment due to travel etc.

Thank my Higher power for my children for without them, I'd have ended this years ago. I've read posts about people with sternums popping, thoracic cracking, desperate measures to live with the pain and the shame, the shame of being treated as a junky, self medicating, the whole gamot of issues and failures and false hope, emptied finances, the lies and the ignorance that is as pervasive in medicine as in politics.
I've not had the luxury of not working and I am a technician on modern cars so the daily contortions I've endured stuffing my 6 foot frame under the dash of a Porsche for instance, well, you have to know chronic pain to appreciate the agony.

And to step outside my own Hell for a moment, I bleed shame and empathy for my family and close friends for what they've endured. My pain was a cost they can't be renumerated for.

Please, be a pit bull, don't let the human with the degree tell you that your body is wrong. I pride myself on being more than my peers in my profession, because I care and I have a skillset I hone, Drs are the same, humans "being" some great, most marginal, more with egos that cloud there vision.

My next challenge is getting my life free of narcotics and building a support around me that includes PT-the gym-yoga and likely more surgery. If I'd given into the pain, I'd be another statistic, my kids left without a father, my parents putting flowers on my grave.

Please, if ONE person finds another round of stregth to pursue a viable solution from reading this, then I've begun the lifelong hope of keeping HOPE alive.

Though I do not wish my horrible pain on anyone, I must say I feel better knowing there are others who is going through the same as me.....

I was in a car accident 2 years ago. The accident was not major (my car was totalled, but no broken bone or anything like that), but I have been suffering from upper left back and shoulder pain since then. I have been on vicodin daily for the past two years and the pain is taking a tall of my work, relatioship and emotional well being. I too had every test possible done, MRI, Xray, nerve conduct, you name it. All they show was very minimum disc bulging., yet there are days my pain is so severe that I cannot even function. The pain changed who I am.

I also was told by some that the pain is phsycological which I know it is not. No one can find why I am in this degree of pain all the time. I also have this severe burning sensation and hyper sensitivity to my upper back area which to me indicates nerve issue, but again, nerve conduct test shows nothing. I am at the lowest point right now, but reading all the posts here gave me hope.

Please please let me know if any of you have any idea or advise. It will mean a lot to me. I have been feeling as if I am fighting this battle alone. I feel that some people are questioning my integrity for I am in the middle of law suit for this accident. I feel frustrated and broken down.

Thank you all for this post. I am so glad that I found this.

I'm sorry you are going through this it can be very upsetting every day of my life for what I go through and to hear what others go through too.
I wanted to just share something that may make you at least remain adamant that it's REAL and continues. My last back surgery at L4-5 required an MRI and when I woke up post op the Doc came in like a half hour later and sad "when we got in there it was alot worse than expected despite the MRI and you really shouldve been fused but we had no idea. Fusion requires that parts
Be made before the surgery and the surgery would've take longer requiring everyone to stay longer and you and I never discussed the possibility of fusion so I'm sorry and I wish you luck" F/@"? needless to say I haven't went back for that fusion and I don't remember if I even went back maybe one time.
So those images won't show everything they just show alot. I'm really sorry for you and everyone here and I fear our future with respect to available pain relief greatly.

im 36 now and first hurt my back at 25. never been the same since. felt like something exploded in there when the injury happened. i have had tons of trigger shots and steroid injections. the older i get the worse i get. i had an mri in 2009 and one again in late 2010. the one in 2009 showed a big bulge in the thoracic area and a doctor from duke ortho was going to do a discectomy. i balked after i learned of the process. the 2010 mri shows nothing remarkable. its like the disc has gone back into place. i feel as miserable as ever. if i lift anything of any sortof mass im sore the rest of the day and my muscles will pull at the slightest mistake by me in handling the way i move. im always sore... always....
any ideas. the current diagnosis from the doctors is to quit being a wuss. but i feel miserable all the time.

Sorry to hear what's going on. I had a lumber herniated disc also and it resolved on it's own but now have Degenerative Disc Disease from the trauma of the injury to my back. Have you been to Physiotherapy yet? Never bend with your back but instead crouch down and hold the load close to your body and never twist your back but move your whole body and neck so no twisting. Don't give up looking for another Dr. for another opinion and can't believe a Dr. said you were a wuss.

PS-Please start your own post as this thread is from someone a long time ago to get more people to help support you. On the left hand column it says create content or Forum topic go there and make a post. We're here to support you. Take care. Charry

Just over 2 months ago I awoke to back pain in my upper and middle back with pain going down into my right arm/hand and leg/foot. Sometimes pain radiates into my chest and stomach. The pain gets unbareable. I went and got an MRI and it says I only have a few small bulges in my neck and nothing in my thoracik area. I feel like there is a knife plunged into the middle of my back always. The pain is relentless. The neurosurgeon is treating me like I am crazy and should have no reason to be in pain. They had me questioning myself. Any advise? Should I request another MRI?

Not only do you have a spine that may or may not be the cause of your pain, and the MRI would seem to show nothing wrong, but you have many muscles and ligaments that may well be the culprits. These work with your spine and are just as important, but tend to get overlooked as the pain feels too strong and sharp to be caused by soft tissue.
I can tell you just how much pain tight tense muscles can cause and it's right up there with anything else.
Stops you in your tracks and like a photo you are frozen in time. Eventually you get a tiny bit of relief and start to move in very small amounts!
I was stuck in the shower once with a bad muscle spasm and couldn't even move to turn the water off.
So make sure you look at all of your options and have the soft tissues checked out. A good sports or remedial masseuse would be a good first stop, as you are bound to need a muscle relaxing massage anyway.
This treatment should tell you if the muscles are in trouble.
Then you should see a physio and get the spine checked out for sticking joints or joints out of alignment. Even a tiny bit will put the muscles into overdrive trying to compensate.
And do they get sore!
My severe muscle problems like this were initially calmed by over a year of massages, but are now under full control from taking magnesium oil every day.
Best treatment I've ever done in 30 years!
Don't expect too much from your GP about either the spine or magnesium. They just don't have the knowledge, in my experience.

Another possibility you might want to consider is a gall bladder? Have you had a complete work up with this. Many times we think of pain and what it could be and we are totally off base. If the doctors didn't find the issues in your spine don't give up as it could be something else causing the problems. I know for myself I went through the same thing, and finally the attacks became more prominent and they found a blocked duct from a stone. So whatever you do don't give up. Look up the symptoms on gall bladders and you might be surprised the pain patterns. good luck and keep us posted.

I've heard that things can show up on a sitting/standing mri scan that don't show on a conventional lying down mri.
I have no evidence or experience myself that this is so, but it seems logical because your spine would be in a position more like it is in the daytime and there might be something which only shows up when the spine is compressed.

Just a thought.

Mick

P.S. this sort of thing:- http://www.fonar.com/news/072711.htm