[steve55]

I was feeling the same way prior to my 3 level ADR. My pain level was 9 and I wondered what Id do if I couldnt rid of the pain after surgery. I got a 3 level ADR and my pain level went to zero afterwards, what a relief. Dr Bertagnoli said putting in my 3 discs was the easy part of my 6 hours surgery that should have only taken 3 hours. The hard part was spending meticulous time decompressing the nerves, one by one at each disc level. He said I was a complicated case due to the nerve compressions. I sense that not all docs are equal in how good of a job they do with that type thing during surgery. You need a top dog with seasoned experience who has handled difficult cases. Something is causing your pain and it seems your docs so far cant locate what it is. FInd out who he best docs are in the US or Europe even, and who has the reputation at spending the time and dedication into working with you till they locate the issue. I think some docs just dont get aggressive and committed enough to finding the problem. Get one who will go to battle for you instead of non chalant attitudes of "sorry, we just cant find anything". Anytime I read of AFR patients who dont have pain relief, I wonder whether their doctor was more focused on the ADR placement than the more important "nerve decompression" part of the surgery.