Epidural for Lower Back Pain.

Caoimhín

Well I am going for one of these wonderful sounding procedures in the next few weeks.
Did anyone here ever have one? Was it painful? Did it work and for how long?

*I am not looking for medical advice, i have lots of that.. just experiences.

houndsoflove

I had an epidural injection in my lower back in march of this year, i got sick of physio and chiropractic care for the last year. So had an epidural injection and to be honest it didn't work for me, i went to my doctor and he said these things can be hit and miss.

In the end i was diagnosed with a neurological condition and maybe this is the reason it didn't work for me.

It will hopefully work for you.

padi89

Had one done a few years back.I found it incredibly painful, came close to passing out.I was in bits after it, took around 3 weeks to settle again.Did nothing for me at all.

klh

I know of a couple of people who have had them, and they all said the same. Sore and it didn't work. They eventually ended up going to see a Neuromuscular Therapist, and got some relief from the visits, but like most things it took a few visits.

Caoimhín

Is there any chance you could email or PM the name of that therapist?

tbh

My mam had one, said it relieved the pain by about 70%. Sounds like she's one of the lucky ones..

dungeon

A friend of mine had it and it lasted for about 6 months. Another friend had it, then another a week later and it seemed to help the second time.

michael1970

Hi, for what its worth......
I suffered from three damaged disks in my lower back, really painful and about 15 years of history. I was down for surgery but was very reluctant to go for it as I have a young child and wouldn't be able to carry hi, play with him, etc for a long time.
My brother came across this therapy in Dublin called "spinal decompression". Its non-invasive and basically regenerates and heals your disks. Seemingly its massive in America but just getting started here. Its not cheap.
20 half hour sessions at €100 a session. However, my disks were completely regenerated as confirmed by the MRI scans and I now have no disk problems and require no surgery. Life is great again.

V9

I had one on my lower back just over a year ago. It lasted about a month. I was gettin pains stemming from my back into my lower left leg at the time, after the epidural it ended up in my right, lord knows how it managed that, 16 months later I ended up having an operation on my back to fix the problem, killed off 90% of the trouble I was having, still lock up form time to time.

In my experience, the epidural is only a short term fix. Sorry if that sounds depressing, OP.

Caoimhín

V9 wrote: »

In my experience, the epidural is only a short term fix. Sorry if that sounds depressing, OP.

Nope, not depressing at all. Like i said, I have had 5 operations on my lower back in the past 4 years so all i want from the epidural is to give me a few months pain and inflammation free for the area to calm down and heal.
I still get locked up like yourself from time to time and I expect i always will. It is now just a case of managing those times correctly and generally staying as active and strong as i can. Some things can really set it off, shaving for example can lead to having to spend a few days in bed recovering .

Caoimhín

michael1970 wrote: »

My brother came across this therapy in Dublin called "spinal decompression". Its non-invasive and basically regenerates and heals your disks. Seemingly its massive in America but just getting started here. Its not cheap.
20 half hour sessions at €100 a session. However, my disks were completely regenerated as confirmed by the MRI scans and I now have no disk problems and require no surgery. Life is great again.

Thanks Michael, i will look into that. Although it is astonishing the amount of quackery, mumbo jumbo and pseudoscience out there when it comes to back pain. In my opinion the quacks are getting clever too, with treatments and procedures dressed up with medical sounding terminology.

I have a simple rule when it comes to treatments though, at the very least it needs to have shown to provide some significant difference in studies carried out and publisher in reputable, peer reviewed medical journals.

Thankfully, with a few clicks of a mouse, a lot of this information is now available to us laymen. After all, it is my spine and i only have one so i do my research before i allow anybody go near it.

gordon_gekko

Caoimhín wrote: »

Well I am going for one of these wonderful sounding procedures in the next few weeks.
Did anyone here ever have one? Was it painful? Did it work and for how long?

*I am not looking for medical advice, i have lots of that.. just experiences.

may i ask which pain specialist you will be under the care of , if you dont wish to say in this public forum , your free to pm me , i myself had a nerve block under a particular pain specialist based in dublin in june and they done me more harm than good , im worse now than ever

michael1970

Caoimhín wrote: »

Thanks Michael, i will look into that. Although it is astonishing the amount of quackery, mumbo jumbo and pseudoscience out there when it comes to back pain. In my opinion the quacks are getting clever too, with treatments and procedures dressed up with medical sounding terminology.

I have a simple rule when it comes to treatments though, at the very least it needs to have shown to provide some significant difference in studies carried out and publisher in reputable, peer reviewed medical journals.

Thankfully, with a few clicks of a mouse, a lot of this information is now available to us laymen. After all, it is my spine and i only have one so i do my research before i allow anybody go near it.

Check out www.joint.ie It will help with your research

LegacyUser

Epidural and Nerve Root blocks do have a high failure rate due to 2 factors. The first is that the wrong pain generating structure(facet,nerve root,disc) was selected for the injection and the 2nd factor will depend on how good the injector is, thinking they are injecting one structure and it isn't where the injection went.

Injections will usually only last for three months, then the effects will wear off. They only will really mask the pain and never treat the underlying cause.
if someone continues to do the activities that caused the back pain in the first place then they will continue suffer back pain. What they need to do during the pain free months is build up the endurance of their core muscles using safe exercises. Stuart McGill has a great textbook on safe and effective exercises that he has tested in a lab setting with patients. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Low-Back-Disorders-Stuart-McGill/dp/0736066926/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1251626515&sr=8-1

There are very little good peer reviewed studies for most low back treatments: (GP,Painkillers,Consultant,Physio, Chiropractor, Osteopathy, Physical Therapy, Neuromuscular Therapy and Acupuncture) i would deem a treatment successful if it could help one person be pain free.

The best approach to to find a good therapist from what ever profession,someone that includes a variety of treatment approaches to suit the individual patient. Joint Mobilisation/Manipulation, Soft Tissue work including acupuncture , Flexion/Distraction, core stability exercises, postural advice.

From a conservative treatment point of view that need to know their limits, when to refer a patient on to a surgeon for a second opinion for conditions such as spinal stenosis etc

From a patient point of view there is no quick fix, low back problems should show good results in around 8-10 treatment sessions for chronic issues. It is important for the person to follow the therapists advice, the more you do your exercises the better results.
I have heard stories of people having 50+ treatments and wonder why they haven't stopped going.

dosed

I had a nerve root block in june. unfortunatley it didnt do anything at all for my lower back pain. procedure was covered by insurance and not too painful, so i'd still say it's worth a shot.

had surgery last week, seems to be doing the trick.

Caoimhín

Cheers for the replies.

I had my second epidural yesterday and it seems to have eased the back pain but time will tell. My legs and feet are still numb and sore so I will have to wait and see about that too.

The next option available to me, if this doesnt help, is to have a small, pacemaker like device wired up to my spine to manipulate the nerves. It is a very last resort and I dont really like the idea of having to plug myself in at night to recharge the internal device.

Kind of like the Bionic man i suppose .

Eoineo

Great to see this thread. I will also be having this procedure shortly.

Not looking for medical advice either but would anyone be able to advise whether I would be best to arrange childcare for the full day & night afterward? TIA

Caoimhín

Eoineo wrote: »

Not looking for medical advice either but would anyone be able to advise whether I would be best to arrange childcare for the full day & night afterward? TIA

Well I was fine after it, just had a little lie down when i got home and stayed off my feet for a while. It wasnt sore really, i was just a little wound up because of the whole doctor/white coat/hospital smell thing.

I suppose the best thing is to follow the advice of the doctor as im sure everyone may have a different reaction.

dosed

Caoimhín - glad to hear you got at least some benefit from the procedure.

the bionic man thing sounds kinda cool, good conversation starter anyway. hopefully it won't come to that.

littlefriend

Eoineo wrote: »

Great to see this thread. I will also be having this procedure shortly.

Not looking for medical advice either but would anyone be able to advise whether I would be best to arrange childcare for the full day & night afterward? TIA

Hi, not sure if you've had this done yet.. my advice would be to arrange a babysitter for the rest of the day and that night and see how you feel.
I had a couple of facet joint injections that were incredibly painful and I felt terrible afterwards. I also had an epidural injection and I couldn't move my left arm at all for about 18 or so hours afterwards. If I had kids I think it would have been difficult for me to look after them afterwards.

squeky

dosed wrote: »

Caoimhín - glad to hear you got at least some benefit from the procedure.

the bionic man thing sounds kinda cool, good conversation starter anyway. hopefully it won't come to that.

I am the bionic woman as i have the spinal cord stimulator implant fitted and if anyone wants to know anything about it then ask me i be glad to help if i can

ali_99

I would really appreciates it if you let me know who and where did you get the operation done ? I am constantly in pain and have been for the last 12 years. I have had one operation 3 years ago and it didnt work, but I am looking for a competant surgeon who have a good success rate with spinal surgeries ? are you happy with the outcome of your operation ? what did they axactly do for you ?

Many thanks.

Ali_99

dosed wrote: »

I had a nerve root block in june. unfortunatley it didnt do anything at all for my lower back pain. procedure was covered by insurance and not too painful, so i'd still say it's worth a shot.

had surgery last week, seems to be doing the trick.

ali_99

I would really appreciates it if you let me know who and where did you get the operation done ? I am constantly in pain and have been for the last 12 years. I have had one operation 3 years ago and it didnt work, but I am looking for a competant surgeon who have a good success rate with spinal surgeries ? are you happy with the outcome of your operation ? what did they axactly do for you ?

Many thanks.

Ali_99

V9 wrote: »

I had one on my lower back just over a year ago. It lasted about a month. I was gettin pains stemming from my back into my lower left leg at the time, after the epidural it ended up in my right, lord knows how it managed that, 16 months later I ended up having an operation on my back to fix the problem, killed off 90% of the trouble I was having, still lock up form time to time.

In my experience, the epidural is only a short term fix. Sorry if that sounds depressing, OP.

Eoineo

Just realised I never updated.

Had the epidural last week and the pain on the day was excruciating. Sorry to say that I've been worse not better but the consultant did tell me that it would take a number of weeks for it to kick in.

So far family members have been helping out with taking care of the baby so that I don't have to do any lifting or carrying thank goodness.

Ali I'm not sure if I can give the person's name on the boards, perhaps a mod might confirm that before I go blabbing everywhere.

tbh

Eoineo wrote: »

Ali I'm not sure if I can give the person's name on the boards, perhaps a mod might confirm that before I go blabbing everywhere.

maybe you could PM the details rather than place them on thread?

sorry to hear you're not better, hopefully the relief will kick in soon.

am i bovvered

Eoineo, sorry to hear this. I have had a lot of back trouble esp this year, not as bad as you though. I really hope you get some relief soon, can you keep us updated, good luck.

Bidd

Caoimhín wrote: »

Cheers for the replies.

I had my second epidural yesterday and it seems to have eased the back pain but time will tell. My legs and feet are still numb and sore so I will have to wait and see about that too.

The next option available to me, if this doesnt help, is to have a small, pacemaker like device wired up to my spine to manipulate the nerves. It is a very last resort and I dont really like the idea of having to plug myself in at night to recharge the internal device.

Kind of like the Bionic man i suppose .

I'm an ex Bionic Woman. I had mine removed. It just didn't work for me. I don't want to one of the naysayers re the SCS. A lot of people have got good results. It is important though to do your research and ask your Consultant a lot of questions.

Boston Scientific and Medtronic are manufacturers of the SCS/Neurostimulators so have a look at their websites for more info. AFAIK different Consultants use different makes.

And no you don't have to plug yourself in at night to charge the system lol. (Though I told my daughter that I would have a hole in my side and I would have to charge myself like a mobile phone :eek::eek: not true, not true!!)

Hope you continue to get good pain relief from the epidural

B