Recent content by Jamie737

No, it’s very different. The disc is jelly like material between the vertebrae. That can protrude and press on nerves - but often shrinks back over time. ‘Listhesis’ is when the body of the vertebra itself displaces in relation to its neighbour.

He definitely has Spondylolisthesis - the vertebral ‘step’ is clear (and one does not try and fix that with surgery)

He would be an unusual patient indeed that recovers from a posterior fusion within a week. All the muscles are stripped off that part of the spine, the bone is drilled into and the nerve root exits are reamed open. 6-8 weeks is quick, 3-6 months is more typical.

True, but still more immediate access to perhaps a more invasive form of stone removal?

LM was however short-sighted in his ‘reasoning’. The health insurance industry is exploitive in that it does not spend all of the premiums it collects on procuring health care for members covered by plans. A substantial amount of that is creamed off as profit. To manage the so-called...

Spondylolisthesis is often seen in younger people that do exercise that flexes the lower back repeatedly, like gymnasts. Sometimes there’s a weaker part of the back part of the vertebral arch - a birth abnormality - that may break, that causes slippage. Exactly this. And it’s true for many...

I have never met anyone who did not sincerely believe that their planned back surgery was going to relieve them of their awful back pain. Sometimes it does. But often it doesn’t. It does relieve nerve root pain reliably, but not back pain. For people with Spondylolisthesis, opening up the exits...

The problem with spinal fusion is that by fixing the one vertebra to the other, you transfer all the natural movement from that part of the spine to the next vertebra. So, if you have a L5/S1 fusion, eventually L4/L5’s disc tends to fail and so on. For that reason it is preferred to delay...

The irony here is that in addition to the ludicrous profits the insurers make, the amount of sheer waste in the system is pretty breathtaking. Without insurance denials and pre-authorizations premiums would be at least double what they are.

Starting to look like a manic episode

Only if there is ‘cauda equina syndrome’. That is an emergency and very unusual. This is likely from fear.

This embittered young man, who had everything going for him self-radicalized by seeking a cause so that he could become a ‘folk-hero’. He set out to become the Unabomber. He picked healthcare. I am pretty sure the hallucinogenics he self-medicated his mental health problems with probably made...

Every spinal surgeon tells (or should tell) patients that back surgery is not guaranteed to relieve back pain. It does relieve nerve-root pain - the pain that travels down the leg. So many people are disappointed after back surgery to find that they are in just as much pain after as before. I...

It is free at the point of service though. The co-payment and co-insurance portions of a spinal fusion surgery in the USA can more than offset the 7% (at top rate) difference in income tax, easily.

And this is what pressure on a nerve root does. Even in the UK he would have had a surgical repair (for free)