Richard from Perth West Australia, looking for help and advice

[Katie]

Welcome Richard You will find that most on this forum have had similar if not exactly the same experiences as you.

I had suffered for almost five years, with local surgeons saying that they do not operate 'just for pain' in my same lumbar levels. I also had a badly compressed spinal cord at the C5/6 level which caused neurological problems.

I found a fabulous surgeon in Brazil who also travels to the US, working with Nuvasive; a top-notch manufacturer of spinal appliances and new minimally invasive approaches to surgery. Dr. Luiz Pimenta was first brought to my attention by another fellow from Perth, Australia, who went to him after his ADR surgery needed revision.

Dr. P's opinion for me was that ADRs were used much too often in the L5/S1 levels, but were a good choice for the L4/5. Unfortunately I was not a candidate for that either. I had discovered that I have severe allergies to all the metals that would be used in spine surgery, including the titanium alloy. A metal free ADR for the lumbar is not yet available anywhere, so I had to have plastic PEEK cages instead, with no reinforcing rods or plates.

But there is a silicone cervical ADR available and it was used in my C5/6.

So I suggest that you have more options than you first thought. A good number of my friends have gone to Stenum with wonderful results. They are more prone to use ADR at all levels, but if necessary will use hybrid surgery...combinations of the above. Each case if different of course, but all that I know have been very happy with the results.

The networking on these spine forums is amazing and has saved my life, literally. I hope we can do the same for you.