Case Histories
Mr. Curtis Leffler
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Following a motor vehicle accident, he was suffering from severe lower back pain and left sciatica, and he was unable to participate in his exercises. Two week after percutanious discectomy, his pain relieve. He returned to his normal activities and sent this photos as token of appreciation.WHAT OUR PATIENTS SAY?
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H.G., is a 24-year-old, beautiful model, who was unable to work for two years following a motor vehicle accident, because of pain in her neck, arms, lower back and legs. She was diagnosed with herniated disc of the cervical spine and lumber spine. She underwent surgery to her neck and lower back. She returned to work in just six weeks. She sent this photo with appreciation.Laser Back Pain Treatment
Laser back pain treatment is used for back pain that does not subside with conventional over the counter treatments, physical therapy and chiropractic help are the next courses of back pain treatment. However, if after several months of treatment the back pain has not improved; back surgery is usually the recommended solution. With new laser back pain treatment surgery, it is possible to restore a patient’s spine to health. Pioneers in this new form of laser back pain treatment include Dr. Rezaian at the California Orthopedic Medical Clinic in Beverly Hills, California. Dr. Rezaian is at the forefront of the laser back pain treatment surgery movement, and boasts over a 98% success rate for patients who use his laser back pain treatment. This success rate even includes patients who tried the traditional open back surgery method without success.
Thanks to its minimally invasive nature, the laser back pain treatment surgery leaves nearly no scar and improves the patient’s back pain almost immediately. Patients can have the laser back pain treatment performed under local anesthesia, and can walk out of the office after the procedure. For sufferers of debilitating back pain, the laser back pain treatment can give them a new lease on life. Recurrent, constant back pain is often the result of herniated or bulging spinal discs, or small spinal fractures. What makes the laser back pain treatment surgery so successful is the way it eliminates only the part of the disc or bone causing the patient pain while leaving surrounding bone, cartilage, muscle and tissues intact. This enables patients who undergo the laser back pain treatment to have a speedy recovery with more successful results than traditional back surgery.
Orthopedic Surgery in California
When facing orthopedic surgery in California may just be one of the best places to find an orthopedic surgeon, boasting some of the top schools in the nation, and thus a competitive pool of experts that leads to incredibly high standards. This is what you want when putting your body into someone else’s hands.
Students of orthopedic surgery in California face a good deal of competition when breaking into the field, and this ensures that experts have gone through a long process and competed against the best to make a place for themselves.
This field of medicine deals with any condition that has to do with the musculoskeletal system. It may employ many different means of treatment of vary levels of invasive-procedures to confront a wide range of conditions that require orthopedic surgery. California orthopedic surgeons may see patients for reasons that are by no means limited to injury and may include degenerative diseases, tumors, disorders, and infections.
That said, a large number of surgeries do consist of trauma or injury. When it comes to orthopedic surgery, California surgeons deal with these five treatments most often: knee arthroscopy, shoulder arthroscopy, carpal tunnel release, knee arthroscopy, and support implant removals.
Maybe you are preparing yourself for orthopedic surgery. California has rigid standards for practicing surgeons, and our organization takes these standards to the next level. In short, you are in good hands when you come to us.
Case Number 1
R.R. is a 40-year old female who was a top executive secretary in an international firm in Los Angeles, California. She injured her neck at work when a shelf fell on her head. She complained of pain in her neck. She was, of course, taken to a medical center. She was examined and had X-rays taken which revealed no fracture or dislocation, and she was referred for physical therapy. In spite of extensive therapy, her pain persisted, and subsequently she developed low back pain with numbness of her limbs.
This patient suffered from pain and missed work on and off for 3 years, while attending physical therapy with no relief. After 3 years, her company fired her. After seeing many prominent physicians and having a negative myelogram, she was finally given a psychiatric diagnosis and sent for psychiatric treatment. Two years later (5 years after the injury), her husband divorced her, unable to tolerate her and her pain. She stayed at home, was taking pain medications, and began eating more and drinking alcohol. Her weight increased to 195 pounds, and she became convinced her paid was psychological.
When she presented to our clinic, she came in walking with two canes supporting her. The key to the diagnosis of her pain was the intermittent quality. The pain was relieved when she lay down and was aggravated when she was upright or bending her neck forward. Because of her pain, a diagnosis of intermittent pain was given, and a myelogram showed 2 herniated discs. She underwent surgical treatment. Five days later, she was walking without assistance and without pain in the hospital corridor.
For the first time in 5 years, this woman was without pain, and she now could begin to rebuild her life. She suffered pain, loss of her work and marriage, and inappropriate psychiatric treatment due to lack of proper diagnosis. The patient’s lost past wages were paid by workers’ compensation. She was retrained and returned to work as a transcriber typist.
Case Number 2
M.S. is a 52-year old female who was in the hospital for 14 days with pelvic traction because of low back pain. She was unable to walk due to pain that was always present with no relief. She had weakness of both legs, urinary incontinence, and was running a mild temperature (fluctuating around 99° to 100°). Lumbar spine X-rays were negative. First myelogram was negative.
This patient also fit well into our classification of low back pain. On reviewing her symptoms and using our criteria, we categorized her pain as constant, the etiology therefore being infection, tumor, or vascular problem. On review of her X-rays, a faint, unusual area was noted at L2-3 disc. Because of her fever, we decided to aspirate this area, and Streptococcus was seen on direct smear. She was placed on intravenous antibiotics and within a few days could walk without pain. She was subsequently discharged, resuming normal activity, and 3 years’ follow up revealed no further problem.
Case Number 3
C.B. is a 37-year old female who was a cashier in a bank and was out of work for 8 months due to a typical pattern of left-sided sciatica pain that was constant. There was no history of trauma. She had no relief of her pain at any time, not even with rest. She was limping due to her pain. The localized skin over the posterior aspect of the thigh along the course of her sciatic nerve was extremely tender to touch. She was afebrile, and she had both myelogram and CAT scan of the lumbar spine, which were negative. Because of inability to find any cause for her pain and because of a recent broken engagement, her doctor gave her a psychiatric pain diagnosis. She was receiving psychiatric therapy without relief.
Using our classification, we diagnosed her as having constant low back pain and therefore began to look for a cause such as infection, tumor, or vascular problem. She was afebrile with no clinical signs or laboratory results indicating infection and presented without vascular signs. Because of the exquisite tenderness over the sciatic nerve and excruciating pain of sciatica, we decided to explore the localized tender area. This was before MRI was available. A neurosurgeon assisting in the case doubted that we would find anything wrong.
At surgery, as we approached the sciatic nerve, a lipoma was found over the nerve. When we reached the sciatic nerve, there was a bulging over the side of the sciatic nerve. As we incised the sheath of the nerve, we discovered a round tumor approximately 10 mm by 10 mm. Histological examination proved it to be a Schwannoma tumor. Her pain was completely relieved postoperatively. She was walking and able to resume her job activity in 7 days. Eight years later she is symptom free.
Case Number 4
K.A. is a 14-year old girl, well-developed and well-nourished for her age. She is the daughter of a finance attorney and developed low back pain and later sciatica after some pre-swimming sports exercises. She was suffering for 18 months before she was referred to our clinic.
She had been frequently seen by her family physician, chiropractor, acupuncturist, neurologist, neurosurgeon, orthopaedic surgeon, and psychiatrist. She had been hospitalized twice and each time had been treated with skeletal traction. Her final diagnosis was psychiatric conversion reaction. She refused to go swimming and stopped going to school because of pain.
She fitted well into our classification. Her pain was intermittent and became worse with coughing and sneezing. Her pain was relieved with rest. Her only limitation was straight leg raising at 20° on the left with positive tension test, and a slight weakness of the posterior tibialis. MRI disclosed slight bulging at the level of L4-5. All other tests, including CBC, ESR, and bone scan were negative.
This patient was diagnosed as having herniated nucleus pulposus of L5-S1. The diagnosis was confirmed by dynamic discography. A percutaneous discography under local anesthesia reproduced her symptoms, and a percutaneous discectomy under local anesthesia relieved her symptoms completely. Three hours later, left straight leg raising was 90°. She stated, "For the last 18 months, I could not raise my leg." She resumed her schooling and swimming 1 week later. Just 2 months after surgery she competed with 250 girls in preparing for the next olympic swimming competition, and she won fifth place. Two years later she is active and cheerful.
Conclusion
We have presented a new clinical classification for diagnosing the etiology of low back pain based on patient history. Using this practical classification has enabled us to diagnose successfully, and therefore treat, over 98% of 600 patients with low back pain.
Since we have adopted the above described classification method, we have seen 600 new patients with back pain. All have been correctly diagnosed. There has not been one patient with so called "psychiatric back pain." We, of course, believe that there are psychiatric patients with psychological pain. However, we firmly believe that when the back pain has a physical etiology, the psychological disturbances can be secondary manifestations and not necessarily the primary cause.
We have also described four case histories as examples, ease of whom were diagnosed with psychiatric back pain, but under our classification each of the four patients was successfully diagnosed and treated. Further details of the sample of 600 patients will be presented in another article.
We have reviewed the medical literature and have found no similar classification. We trust that this new classification can now be useful for other practicing physicians.