My husband has had severve back and leg pain for 4 plus weeks, he had an MRI and it showed a focal disc extrusion at the left paracentral location of the posterior aspect of the L5-S1 intervertebral disc resulting in spinal canal stenosis and moderate left neuroforaminal narrowing. This is resulting in a mass effect upon the traveliung left sided sacral nerve roots and existing L-5 nerve roots. His doctors have had him on several medications including steriods and recently referred him to an ortho/spinal doctor but he can't been seen for another 4 weeks, is this soemthing that should be looked at sooner
Optional Information: Person's Gender: Female Person's Age: 45
Hello from JAA very important question.Let me ask you:Does he have any weakness.
Yes he does in his left leg. He has constant pain in his leg, knee and hip and has had numbness and lack of feeling on and off in the leg at times, even when on the many medications they have prescribed.
OKI am concerned that he is not receiving adequate intervention.What I would do if he were my patient:Get him into a physical medicine and rehabilitation doctor, right now, today, or no later than Monday or Tuesday.These are MD specialists and the doctor can do an EMG/nerve conduction study in the office to see if nerve damage is occurring. Also can provide traction techniques, etc.A lot of this can be alleviated without surgery in many cases, but I am concerned that he could develop a surgical emergency here, with weakness.So I would call the referring doctor right now, tell them what I said, and decide if perhaps the EMG/NS can be done today somehow...that might be possible.Then follow up for some intervention such as the correct traction, physical therapy help, etc...to attempt to avoid surgery.Let me know if you have further questions
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