Hello everyone,
Sorry for the delay, but I'm home and ready to tell my story. Me and my sister arrived in Barcelona on Dec. 5th and checked out the city for a few days before my schedule date for surgery. On Dec. 7th we saw Dr. Clavel and went over the procedure and he answered all of our questions and was very professional and reassuring about the 3 levels that he was going to replace, c56,c67,c7/t1. After we did somemore sightseeing and got a feel for the city.
On Dec.9th, we arrived at the Quiron Hospital at 730 am and were sent down to get x rays and blood work done, which took about 2 hours and then up to admissions for an assigned room. Once we arrived in the room we checked it out and it was awsome, big and private and clean. After we got situated a nurse came in and took my medical history and vitals and said that someone would ve up shortly to take me down to the OR. Within 20 min I was on my way down and met the anastelogist who asked my weight and allergies and then had a nurse run the IV. Afterwards DR. Clavel came over and asked how I felt and I said nervous but ready, he said well let's go get this done, don't worry, within five min I was out and knew nothing until recovery.
Once I came to I was asked if I had any pain and to my surprise I did not, I was quite comfortable and warm with a soft collar on. Within the next hour or so I was back up to my room.the Dr. Had already been up to reassure my sister that everything had gone beautifully and that c/7/ t1 was hard to get to but they got it and it was perfect, he expected a good recovery. He said my muscular neck and trapezious muscles were hard to get by and that surgery took about 4 hours. Once back in my room the nurses came by about once every couple of hours to check to see if I had pain and check my fluids, I really had no pain so meds were not needed. After about 8 hours the DR. Came in and asked how I was doing and I said ok, but I lost my voice and my throat was so sore to swallow, but other than that I was good. He wants to sit me up and walk me over to the chair so I could eat and man I had to pee too. So I got to the chair carefully and went to the bathroom and then finally got a meal. Man I had to chew, chew, chew cause it was so hared to swallow food or liquids, and I coughed everytime I did either. This worried mencause I didn't want to move the discs, but the doc said they were in pretty good and not to worry. So afterwards I fell asleep on off for the rest of the night.
The next day I was up walking by my self and by mid day the PT had come in and took the soft collar off and did some flexion and extension exercises with me and I had no pain, a little stiff but not enough for meds, so then the collar went back on and the PT said I was gonna do fine because of my thick neck muscles. So I watched tv and with my sister the whole day and by sat day I was up in the shower and needed no soft collar. Dr. Clavel came in and removed the drain and had x rays taken and said that the placement was perfect and he expects a full recovery, I was discharged and told to come see him the following Thursday for a followup. So me and my sister did some sightseeing all week, we probably walked forty miles, Barcelona is beautiful.on the following Thursday we saw the doc and he removed the banddage and stitches and said I would be fine gave me all of my records and said if I had any questions to email him and he would get back to me asap.
So I'm 11 days post op and here's what's going on, my neck feels perfect, although I do have some weird sensations like before surgery with flexion of the neck and I have some residual numbness in my hand and ring and pinky fingers. So I'm thinking thy maybe when he cleaned out the c7/t1 disc that maybe the nerve root got irritated and it may take some time to calm down, and I also heard that I may be stuck with the numbness forever depending on the extent of the damage. But he said that the c7/t1 disc had reabsorbed somewhat, so I'm not sure and it's so soon after surgery that I'm just gonna wait at least a month to see what happens, then I'll email him, he's very cool and undestanding by the way, I loved his bedside manner. So well see.
So there you have it, I just wanted to say thank you to mark and the forum members for all the info and stories you all share for others to make an informed decision. Without you all I would not have known what to do or how to go about it, so thank you all so very much. My contribution will be to report my progress every month so that others can continue to get informed honest information on their options and to let them know they are not alone. If anyone has any specific questions please post them or pm me, also my email adress Is
jalexander@gmx.com, you can feel free to email me questions also. Again thank you all so much.
God Bless, Jarrod