Learn be back surgery

So I’ve been living with back pain for a long time. Not an achy back or sore muscles, but sharp pain along my spine, usually between my shoulder blades. it all stems from a severe car accident I had 22 years ago. I the last 6 years I’ve had 3 or 4 instances where I’ve had a pinched nerve. Each one left me on my back for 4-6 days at a stretch in pain that I couldn’t have imagined before that happened. For the last 18 months or so I don’t think I’ve had more than a few days at a time with some degree of back pain. This weekend I must have slept wrong, because I’m in pain again. Not the debilitating pain where I can’t get up, but my movement is limited quite a bit. My 8 year old actually said “Daddy, I hope you feel better soon. I want to be able to hug you how I want without hurting you.”
For the record, I’ve tried chiropractors. I’m not wasting my time again. The first two I went to just sucked money out of my wallet for a few years each. The third one said I have degenerative disc disease and the best he could do was maintain the level of discomfort I was currently experiencing. Then he just tried to sell me his brand of alternative healing and such.
Enough is enough. I’ve avoided going to see a doctor because I’ve always heard that you really want to avoid back surgery at all costs. Now, I know I might be jumping the gun, but for the sake of this discussion, I’m assuming a doc will want to operate.
Has anyone had back surgery, and what was the repair? What was the outcome? Any advice?

I've had lower back surgery. It helped with the immediate nerve issues (which had gotten bad enough that my foot was dropping when I walked), but did little to end the chronic stiffness and pain. Short answer, it may help with the nerve issues, but you'll always have a bad back.

Sorry to hear about your pain, that's not a good way to go through life.

Have you been to a good physical therapist? You may have a muscular imbalance that could be corrected and save you from the knife.

KyAllroad: no, I have not. I haven't looked into that much, I think it's because of my experience with chiropractors. Hiw do you go about finding a good one?

I'm living with chronic back pain, so I understand where you are coming from; mine got so bad that I simply could not function for a day's work, the pain itself clouded everything I did and the painkillers were even worse.

I can't speak to your exact experience because mine is due to a different cause, which is compression fractures due to tumor damage. Again in my case but it may not apply to yours, the answer was (and is) kyphoplasty. It made a significant improvement in my quality of life when the first two (T9 and L4) were done, I am now working toward having the other three (T8, T10 and T11) done and hope to be close to normal when that's done. However, there's more to it; I have rib problems due to the same tumor thing, the only fix for that is to kill off the tumors and let the ribs heal on their own. That will take time, probably another 2 years; the chemotherapy drastically slows the bone healing.

I don't know if kyphoplasty is the answer for you, all I can say is I sincerely hope you can see some improvement with whatever course you take.

In reply to DrBoost: Well, I go to my mom but that doesn't help you so much. I guess I'd ask around locally and get some references. A good PT will have a reputation.

Have you seen a pain management specialist or tried physical therapy? Either may be able to help (but may not depending on your situation).

I have a ruptured L5/S1 and the pain had gotten bad enough that I was finally willing to consider surgery about 15 years ago. I hadn't been pain free for over 6 months and was missing a lot of work (at least 3 or 4 days per month). I wasn't sleeping more than a few hours each night. From what I had been able to learn, disc fusion was the "normal" procedure for ruptured discs, partial discectomy might be an option under some circumstances, and there were FDA trials going on for approval of several (3 or 4) replacement discs. The replacement disc trials were 50% of the participants got disc fusion (control group) & 50% got a disc replacement and you would not know which you were getting until after the surgery.

When I saw a neurosurgeon, I expressed my concerns regarding what I had learned about the probable outcome of surgery to remove the disc and fuse the two vertebra (because this is the lowest disc it supports all your weight and removing it tends to overstress the others so you have periodic failures of the next disc above and after 3-4 disc removals & fusions over the next 10-12 years one is essentially unable to bend over). He understood my concerns and was very conservative in his treatment approach. He wanted to start with the least invasive option and move up as needed. He sent me to a pain management specialist to evaluate me for a cortisone injection and said if that provided at least 3 months of relief it was a viable option for a while. He prescribed pain meds that would let me sleep, but I couldn't take them during the day because of needing to think at my job. I had the injection about 4 weeks later and it was like a magic bullet. I got the lecture that this doesn't always work and due to the trauma of the needle I might feel even worse for several days. I woke up the morning after the injection (after 7 or 8 months of constant pain) and my first thought was "Something isn't right, what is wrong?" My second though was " Oh, actually something is right!" My pain was gone.

I had several more injections over the following couple of years and they kept working. The pain specialist I saw was in pretty high demand and it usually took 3-4 weeks before I could get an appointment. In my situation, I had discovered a predictable cycle with how the pain progressed and could anticipate how/when the pain would get to a level that would require an injection but I missed the mark a bit the last time. A week or so before my last injection, the pain got really bad again and I saw my regular MD for some pain meds to get me to the date for my injection. My MD suggested physical therapy if I could catch it early enough the next time around. Next time the cycle started I went to my MD and he sent me for PT. It worked and in the last 10 years I haven't had an injection or surgery. I have gone to PT several times and I do specific exercises daily, but no other procedures and I only have occasional back pain that goes away after 2-3 days. I am extremely careful and try not to do things that may cause me further problems, but I've had a far better result than I expected many years ago.

You really, really, really want to avoid back surgery. However, there comes a time when it's needed. Find a neurosurgeon or an orthopod that specializes in backs.

Thanks all for your input. I'm going to see my MD and ask about PT.

My wife has been seeing a pain management doctor for her lower back and it has been working well. She is sore for a day or two after but then she goes months feeling better. If you do need surgery ask around about doctors. My dad had one years ago and had no problems but there seem to be at least as many horror stories as there are successes.