For the few and curiously bored out there, I am posting an update on my continuing medical problems. Several months ago I contacted a renowned authority on Arachnoiditis who suggested I go to a University medical school due to the complexity of my problems. He suggested that I first try the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. If only I had the financial resources to go there, as it is a very impressive institution with a stellar line up of medical professionals. But I am financially limited to Oklahoma, so I found a neurosurgeon affiliated with a medical school who basically sought to not establish the possibility of having Arachnoiditis.
He ordered a CT of my abdomen with contrast, an EMG, and a MRI without contrast of the lower lumbar. Additionally, upon my first visit (there was only two) he never once mentioned the A-Word—Arachnoiditis. He even reviewed my MRI showing clumped nerve roots and a report stating nerve clumping on the L5-S1. It quickly became apparent to me that he sought to dismiss my pain symptoms as being attributed to Arachnoditis. He immediately tried to discount my pains after I told him it started right after a blood patch. Collusion.
Doc: “Yea, but said you already had back problems?” And so forth it rolled out from his forked tongue. Even a swamp dwelling lawyer would glow with pride from an aspiring wannabe executing quick fire tricky interrogation.
In the end, he suggested a nerve root block from a pain management facility. If my research is correct, this would involve epidural injections—the number one cause of Arachnoiditis. No, I will not do any nerve root blocks into the spine. Meanwhile, two days after visiting him, my CSF leak manifested again.
Rotten, stinking collusion. It exists among doctors and medical professionals who do not even know each other. They possess cunning, unethical dexterity in applying medical cat litter to the mistakes of their fellow colleagues. By not using contrast or gadolinium on the MRI, the convenience of obscurity to cover up the stench of medical mishaps won out once again. Simply by omission.
Yes, I have spondylolisthesis on the L5-S1 and I went years up to the day of blood patch without it dragging me down into a pit of debilitating pain in my back, legs, feet—even searing pains in abdomen. I had Sciatica which at times hit me hard, but nothing in this world compares to the types of pain which came upon me following the blood path. NOTHING. By this neurosurgeon not looking for lesions pointing towards Arachnoiditis, he conveniently made a path to attribute the pains to spondylosis. The EMG doctor stated “Radiculitis” on her exiting report. This is not surprising, for anyone with Arachnoiditis stemming from their lower spine will probably have radiculopathy. It arrives in the early phase of the condition.
How does the medical profession not address Arachnoiditis? By trying not to look for it. Secondly, by discounting the patient’s symptoms and attributing their pain to something else. Additionally, misclassification will keep their kindred fellows out of court and not weaken their own personal resumes for their next chop shop facility. They conveniently alter records, or selectively release medical records like my former neurosurgeon has done with my new doctors. Ignorance of Arachnoiditis is certainly at play as well, even among radiologists, doctors, and yes, some neurosurgeons.
Collusion. It plays silent, it pleads ignorance, and it blames the victim and any convenient ailment in its path so the condition remains a dirty iatrogenic secret. Meanwhile the overt and covert actions of those in medicine set the victims of Arachnoiditis down the path of blacklisting spawning medical blow offs by refusing to see patients or dismissing them using creative ingenuity.
Ah…windy Oklahoma. Half of these doctors fall to their knees nightly thanking God for their good fortune, nice homes, stocks, and Grey Anatomy’s working conditions. The next day they commence back to Systemic Killing. Death by omission. Omission by collusion.
Case in point of how silence speaks a thousand words. I disclosed my plight to an established forum of doctors wishing to discuss rare and unusual cases amongst a variety of medical professionals. After outlining a sequence of events, a host of responses poured in from virtually every type of doctor from radiologists, to neurologists, to gastroenterologists, to family practitioners, to pain management, to psychiatrists, to endocrinologists , internal medicine, and even more… EXCEPT FOR NEUROSURGEONS! Neurosurgeons were blatantly absent. Not one neurosurgeon responded—not one.
Systemic killing. It happens all the time, with the poor, with the hard cases, and with the hard cases of Arachnoiditis. Some of its victims are known to commit suicide and if there was ever an ailment requiring powerful pain medications, this is one. All I want to know is am I dealing with Arachnoiditis, and if so, what is the extent of my current condition. Answers cannot be obtained when doctors try not to find it by doing MRIs without contrast, when facilities lack qualified radiologists to interpret results, and medical professionals reclassify Arachnoiditis as a different condition. The medical community cannot empathize or sympathize with the brutality of it, they do not even want to recognize it—let alone deal with it. Iatrogenic in nature, collusion and Arachnoiditis will continue to walk hand in hand.
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Fiery Trials 