TV USB Power

[Bob Williams]

I learned to bend at the knees a long time ago, but now the knees are getting worse, I need another Plan. The carbon fibre vertebra near the top of my spine, means limited head & neck movement up, down and sideways. I know all about it if I try to exceed the limits! One thing pain teaches, is not to do that again, whatever that may be. Post-Op in ’95, I was walking gingerly outside when the BBMF Spitfire MK XIV flew overhead at low altitude. That Mark has the growly, snarly Griffon engine and puts out much higher db’s than the Merlin. I forgot, looked up too quickly and with too much movement, passed out, fell backwards. I was unconcsious before I hit the floor, so felt nothing, but had a head extension at the back, and one heck of a headache when I woke.

SWMBO’s verdict was that I was fortunate to have landed headfirst, having damaged nothing important. She thinks sympathy would embarrass me…. :negative:

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[Anonymous]

I use bending at the knees as a rule but with the TV I need to bender under & up sort of thing.

Something has gone wrong this week and the pain in my back, down my left leg is as bad as it was before the op.

I feel the nerve has trapped again, the doc upped my gabapentin and has referred me back to the specialist.

Here’s the TV

 

[Ed P]

Sorry about your back John. Your latest pic appears to show SIX component connections in two rows the bottom seems to be labeled input and the left-most one is the video. I would guess that the top row is component OUT.

[Anonymous]

Thanks Ed

From what I recall in the past the back row of 3 has a yellow socket and the front row has a blue socket.

When I took the first photo (above in thread) I tried to take a photo of the sockets, it didn’t work.  I am yet to investigate further I wish the sockets were in a more suitable position.

[Bob Williams]

John I hope that back pain is easier, I experienced all that pain down the leg for many years, left side too. Is there any ‘tingling’ or pins & needles with it, before or after the pain hits for real? I ask because that is how my own problems began. What sort of Op was it?

They diagnosed me as having a ‘slipped disc’ for over 15 years, that is the old catch-all term for “have no clue”. Not until I had a series of MRI, Ultrasound and CT scans, did they find and operate on the real problem, which was a shattered vertebra. The broken pieces were damaging the nerves to the LH side of my limbs and I was eventually heading for paralysis, starting with the pain and tingling down the leg. Have you had scans?

The other favourite term for all the oldphart consultants, is Sciatica. It’s an indication of something deeper, they stick labels on conditions to make you think they know what they are talking about. Not saying all this as a frightener, but I had years of being fobbed off by Talking Medical Heads.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[The Duke]

I get massive ‘slow and sharp’ pins and needless, on my feet and anckles, if i sant still for more than 3 mins (brushing teeth, that’s how I know it’s 3 mins, or is I sit on a dining room table for more than 10mins.

[Bob Williams]

The Duke wrote:

I get massive ‘slow and sharp’ pins and needless, on my feet and anckles, if i sant still for more than 3 mins (brushing teeth, that’s how I know it’s 3 mins, or is I sit on a dining room table for more than 10mins.

There is something happening there Steve, I know how you are fixed with the Duchess being ill, but try to get to see your GP about that. The right consultant and the right scans, would at least tell you what the problem is.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[The Duke]

I’m fully scanned, and upto date, I’ve damaged 4 disks, from L2 upwards, L2 is about 5th of the size it should be, the other 3 are just misshapen.

As its more than 2 disks, they won’t touch it  :negative:

[Anonymous]

Bob

I do get pins & needles in my left foot

It was a discectomy, 3 odd years ago.

Mine is Sciatica.

The discectomy was to remove discs. They didn’t remove a disc (said they were too good) My problem was a squashed trapped nerve. They un-trapped it but it can’t be repaired.

I am always in pain (even after the op), I get some comfort after physio ( I do that 10+ times a day)

I know what I can and can’t do to keep the pain at bay.

Last Monday I attended a meeting (2hrs) sitting without physio.

Since then the pain is like it was before the op (like the nerve has trapped)

The doc upped the gabapentin and paracetomol, the tramadol remains the same and has referred me to the consultant.

I am using deep heat patches, Ibuprofen gel. I can’t get comfort when in bed, so not sleeping much.

Just sitting here typing, my left leg is killing me.

This has been written in stages on notepad (as always)

 

[The Duke]

I find that the ‘Tens machine’ work quite well if my back plays up. It doesn’t really dull any pain more rakes your attention from the source.

It’s been a while since I fired mine up, so time I go a year or two with out using it, but always like it when I fire it up.

Like you I know my limitations, you just have to work around them, as one lapse of concentration and you can be laid up for a week or 4.

The most enjoying thing about the having lower disk damage, (probably applies you upper also) is when you do have a moment and your ‘backs gone’, is when people say “you know lying down doesn’t help, you should be up moving!”

I’m like, OMG, where have you been for my last 16 or so years, if only some one would of told me that. The soon get I’m being sarcastic.

It is true, keeping fit, keeping your core strong helps to prevent episodes, bit if you throw a disk or two, you ain’t even rolling off a bed, never mind “exercising”.

The trouble with having a bad back everyone thinks cos they have pulled a muscle or briefly trapped a nerve, they know what the pain is. Any one with back issues, knows every day of your life, the good days, your usually functioning at a pain level of 5, the bad days 6 to 7, and when it goes, you lie as still as you can holding an 8, knowing just a move of a toe or one breath to large will inflict an number 10.

I don’t think there is anything like back pain. Tooth achs bad, as is ear ach. But I’d but back pain above breaking a bone, I’ve don my leg, my ankle, collar bone, jaw and a few knuckles. The leg hurt in the moment. The collar bone nor so much, well I factored that ages 6 in a motor bike come lamppost incident, then two weeks later fell of my school chair and broke it.

The break hurt, the fracture not so much. The ankle I only learned I broke it two years after the fact, when I pulled my ligaments in the RM, an X ray showed I haven’t broken the it, but they asked when did I last brake it as thet could see the calcium build up. My mind went back to about two years prior when I slipped down a curb playing football, and thought I’d sprained it. I told my mum I thought I’d done something, she thought I was trying to get it of school.

Ive got off topic, bit log story short, out off my many pains, my back is the worst pain I’ve experiance. That and pulling a muscle in your chest, thst is a strange one, it’s very high on the 1-10 scale, probably an 8, but it’s a satisfying pain.

Like, when your backs ‘playing up’  but not ‘gone’ , and you can prod the swallon disks patruding out. You know nothing good can come of it, but in the moment, it’s a satisfying pain, almost calming.

Or is that just me :scratch:

 

[Anonymous]

Duke

In between physio sessions I would stay on my back, it was real comfort. If I stay on my back now my leg hurts, so I have lost that point of comfort.

I did once ask my doctor to refer me for a leg amputation, he said the pain isn’t in my leg and amputation wouldn’t help.

I have had many falls

I am one big pain.

[JayCeeDee]

The Duke wrote:

I’m fully scanned, and up to date, I’ve damaged 4 disks, from L2 upwards, L2 is about 5th of the size it should be, the other 3 are just misshapen. As its more than 2 disks, they won’t touch it

 

Seeing what Dr. Noel Fitzpatrick ( Supervet ) can do, and I’m not making comparisons in any way, before some wag interjects, it makes me wonder whether that decision is medical or financial.

He’s done some amazing work – on a Great Dane iirc – fusing two sets of vertebrae with rods and using “nylon nuts” sideways on as replacement discs. It’s a year or so since I saw it, so I’m rusty on the detail.

 

[Richard]

The Duke wrote:

I’m fully scanned, and upto date, I’ve damaged 4 disks, from L2 upwards, L2 is about 5th of the size it should be, the other 3 are just misshapen. As its more than 2 disks, they won’t touch it

I have had two ops on my back, one lumbar and one thoracic. In each case a number of vertebra were involved, My spinal column looked like and probably still looks like a mouldy banana where it was (is) being crushed, the rest looks more like a polo mint. The lumbar spine was a success and I can now walk once more, stand up and not need crutches, before that my left leg was withering. The Cervical spine business was less successful. The first vertebra under the skull is not straight but tipped over, the next 4 are ‘not right’ two are so tightly jammed together they look like one big one and the rest are again pressing on the spine and in very close contact with each other. The surgeon delayed treatment once as he did not want to operate on such a complex situation but in the end went ahead, after spending twice the allotted time to achieve half the result he wanted he gave up but did manage to wedge some of the vertebra apart with clips. Unfortunately the nerves serving my left arm and neck are almost always being pressed so neck movement is restricted and pain is constant. I am told that the damage is too severe and extensive to operate again but I should have an injection on Saturday to see if that will relieve the situation. The last surgeon to operate said my problems had been left too long and should have been treated 7 or 8 years earlier. It all started in 2002 and all I got then was tablets and a bit of physiotherapy that did nothing because it was aimed at the wrong areas. It was not until 2012 that the GP sent me for an MRI – when the results came back the GP called me in and warned me of a whole long list of possible symptoms that might occur before I had an operation. If I felt any of them I was told I had about 8 hours to get to and through A&E to a theatre for an operation or the result would be life limiting there and then.

Bottom line, it must be a local ruling that if more than one pair is damaged they will not do anything. I would try for a second opinion, though it might depend on the severity of your symptoms.I was using the use of limbs so that might have tipped the balance.

I agree that for the most part pain killers do nothing, I have tried diclofenac, VIOXX (the withdrawn Merck killer pill), now I take Naproxen, but have also tried Tramadol, Gabapentin and a few others. I saw no point in most of them and Tramadol did not even have any ‘high’ effect it just stopped up my stomach – so it was pointless.

PS Edits plus: I agree the comment about Noel Fitxpatrick, he does things to things with bones like matchsticks and achieves things with many cases that must make other humans jealous. I wish I could run about like some of the dogs, cats and other animals he treats with previous spinal problems

[JayCeeDee]

About 7 years ago, the wife sat down in my computer chair without realising the back wasn’t locked out of recline and she suffered an unexpected short, sharp, rapid, recline. She could walk, albeit painfully, but she knew she’d done something bad, so we went to the GP, expecting a hospital referral. We got one and the hospital sent her for an x-ray.

This showed that she had arthritis on the base of her spine and in her hips. She was 56/57 at the time so that was hardly breaking news. They sent her off for some physio which eased, but didn’t resolve the hurt, and referred her to a local gym programme – “Fit for Life” – which she attended.

She carried this on for about 5 years and heard about a “Pain clinic” which she thought might help, as the arthritis couldn’t be cured, but it might have been managed better. She eventually got a referral, but needed an MRI before any decision was made. You can see where this is going, I’m sure.

The MRI came back and she was called in urgently. It turns out that when she fell back in my chair, a disc had come out, L5 I think, and was laying vertically instead of horizontally, against the sciatic nerve, apparently called a sequestrated disc. Whereas a fairly simple operation, or even manipulation, 7 years previously, would have re-inserted the disc between the vertebrae, it had now withered and nothing could be done short of a major operation. She is reluctant to undergo this until it has become a last resort.

The gym programme, along with swimming/water aerobics, plus sessions of mild yoga and pilates, as well as losing 4 stone, has made mobility easier. A by-product of that is the surgeon that was looking at the imminent probability of hip replacements has praised her efforts and said her regime has put off the necessity for immediate ops, and to come back to see him when she can’t cope any longer.

All because they couldn’t be bothered to do an MRI, and we didn’t know that problems that wouldn’t show up on x-ray, would on an MRI. I hear on so many occasions from different folk, including iirc on here, that an MRI showed what an x-ray had missed. We all should take this on board and insist on MRI’s, they do seem to be a more complete tool in the consultant’s box.

[Ed P]

Money again John . An MRI costs about 20 times that of an XRay ~ £1000/pop.

[The Duke]

To maybe make you feel better, the MRI scams I had in 2002 where not a batch on the ones I had 10 years later. The diffence was 1950 grainy TV to 4k, I remeber when I had my first proper look in my back, I was amazed how far they come In 10 years.

Also i love the way the doc can slice the 4d image any which way and get any view s/he wants.

I don’t recall that being on offer in 2002. It may well of been, but the desk top pc in the consultents rooms may not of been up to it back then, so they couldn’t “slice you up” on the fly. Ether way the actually final pictures wasn’t very good, closer to an ultrasound picture, so whatever your wife did, may not of been picked up.

I personally think we should all get yearly mot’s, MRI and full bloods. Try and practice proactive medicine instead of reactionary medicine.

[JayCeeDee]

Ed P wrote:

Money again John . An MRI costs about 20 times that of an XRay ~ £1000/pop.

 

I think that might be the cost of a full body scan – prices vary, but seem to start from £200 – £250 per body region. Info from HERE . But I don’t doubt cost is a factor, as per my comment to Steve.

 

I personally think we should all get yearly mot’s, MRI and full bloods. Try and practice proactive medicine instead of reactionary medicine.

 

Hear, hear. I actually got invited for one now I’m 65, but haven’t got round to booking it up yet.

Even on a not so good MRI from 2010, I reckon they’d have noticed a missing disc.

[Bob Williams]

Wherever my head goes when I meditate, has to be a great place. I have to thank my old HK mate Victor Lim for teaching me that, I firmly believe that it has given me a quality of life that I would not have with pain relief medication. The only problem is that I can lose segments of time, but the family know that when I ask to be excused, I am off somewhere quiet to do my thing. The other problem is that I know my physical mobility is now on borrowed time: what was pain is again becoming numbness and there is nothing more they can do, it means my spinal nerves are too badly damaged to recover. That is the clincher, I can deal with pain but it was very clearly pointed out to me that I gained some time with the op in ’95. The fault lies with the consultants who treated me for >15 years, for a ‘slipped disc’ and gave me Traction treatment. One highly paid muppet even told me that I had “…an odd gait.” He almost received my ‘odd’ foot in his wotsits. 🙁

I have had the active time that I might not have had, but I refuse to allow the thought of what might happen, to impinge upon my life. I look upon every day as a bonus.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[Author]

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