Anonymous wrote:My mom is 76 and has developed a crippling back issue. She can barely walk (a few steps with a walker); needs a hospital bed at home, round the clock carers and is in pain and on hardcore pain meds at all times. Prior to this which happened in the last 6 mos, she was a very active person. Now it’s like she is 95. Multiple surgeons consulted say fusion is the only answer but it’s a big surgery with a recovery that would be challenging for a 30 yo man; and I read so many horror stories of people who seem to be even worse off after them. I’m being supportive of her decision but is that the right thing? I’m concerned it will be a terrible result and kind of end up being the end of her. Wwyd?

Have her take the Galleri cancer screening test and then look really hard for cancer if it says she might have cancer:

https://www.galleri.com/

My mom had intractable back pain for a long time. It turned out to be metastatic breast cancer.

I would get her Dr. Sarno’s book on back pain. My mom went from crippling pain to cured after reading. She is not at all into wellness or whack theories, but swears dealing with her anger solved her pain. Worth a shot prior to surgery.

Honestly I would do whatever is less expensive in this scenario.

PP, are you serious? Do you know what it would cost to have this surgery in the US and pay out of pocket? I'm guessing it would be a couple hundred grand...

OP, where are you? If you are in the DMV, and could get your mom here, I cannot recommend Dr. Vinay Deshmukh highly enough. He did minimally invasive laminectomy/fusion surgery on my mom, who was 81 at the time of the surgery (coming up on 9 months ago) and has Type 2 diabetes to boot. I cannot be happier that she went with him over the allegedly brilliant but stereotypically arrogant and rude surgeon she'd first scheduled with.

He's with Medstar and operates at Georgetown but she sees him for follow-ups at his office in McLean.

The surgery was 100% worth it. She was on painkillers after the surgery for a couple of days in the hospital, but has had literally no pain from the compressed nerve/sciatica since she woke up from surgery. She still uses a cane and a foot brace for stability because the sciatica damaged her nerve so much she has foot drop, but she doesn't have to walk bent over ("shopping cart syndrome") anymore and she's gotten her life back.

Dr. Deshmukh has published research on how much safer minimally invasive surgery is in terms of blood loss, infection, etc. which was important given my mom's higher infection risk/potentially longer healing times because of her diabetes.

I truly think my mom might have decided to end things if she hadn't had the surgery. Her pain was intractable and medications didn't work (opioids don't work for her). She lived with the pain for years but it wasn't really living.

My dad did the surgery (5 vertebrae fused) and got his life back. Recovery was tough but way better than the pain.

Look up Pain Reprocessing Therapy. It really helps reduce some of the pain.

Anonymous wrote:Nurse here. Sorry you are all going through this. You say you're concerned that if its unsuccessful, it will be the beginning of the end. The unfortunate reality is that without the surgery, its the beginning of the end. An immobile elderly person is at a big risk for lots of different complications.


With a 60-80% success rate, she should do the surgery. It will be a tough recovery process but being immobile and in a severe amount of pain will cut her life short. Obviously it doesn't seem like she will be able to fly to the US to get this surgery. Are you able to take off a chunk of time to be with her after surgery?

Thank you for this pov! She is going to get the surgery in march. She had a dexa scan and her bones are fine to go fwd.
they live in a different country so I will go over for a couple weeks for the surgery and after but cannot stay for too long. They have live in 24h care though so that will help. Wise words and Ty

Nurse here. Sorry you are all going through this. You say you're concerned that if its unsuccessful, it will be the beginning of the end. The unfortunate reality is that without the surgery, its the beginning of the end. An immobile elderly person is at a big risk for lots of different complications.


With a 60-80% success rate, she should do the surgery. It will be a tough recovery process but being immobile and in a severe amount of pain will cut her life short. Obviously it doesn't seem like she will be able to fly to the US to get this surgery. Are you able to take off a chunk of time to be with her after surgery?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm sorry, I just read she is 76. She had good quality of life before the back issue? 76 is still fairly young. She could have another 25 years.

There is no easy solution here. It sounds like 6 months ago she was very active. You've talked to multiple surgeons. What does her PCP say? Sometimes I lean on my PCP to advise in these situations.

Her quality of life is very, very low now. She is only 76. What does Mom want? I'd probably lean heavy on what Mom wants. Is she motivated to do rehab after surgery to build up her muscles?

25 more years? That’s extremely unlikely.

True but even 10 more years of constant pain and limited mobility would be a living hell.