Health Problems

Multiple doctors, clinics, and hospitals in a few states including the Cleveland clinic and Mayo clinic still have no idea. It never gets better but it gets worse in waves.

My blood says I'm incrediably healthy. I continually am losing a lot of strength on both sides of the body.

And of course throw in dealing with some clinics/hospitals. To get my medical records to send to Mayo was like pulling teeth. One hospital said they had no records and no record of me ever being there. I had copies of some of the test and copies of bills but they act like they never heard of me.

so nearly 2 months later, still having back pain
at 1st it was all the way across my mid back (green box), not a constant pain, but spasms and sharp cramps when i would move. would only last 1-3 mins. it would hurt the 1st time doing something but once that passed could do that repeatedly with little problem. like 1st time getting something off a high shelf, sharp pain, wait it out, then could keep doing with little to mild pain.

procrastinated and tried a bunch of otc stuff and muscle relaxers to no avail. went to doctor around mid march. found blood in my urine, but doc though that was unrelated and probably passing a sliver of a stone again. started taking 800mg Ibuprofen which did nothing for the pain but reduced the inflammation. over a week it went from all the way across my back to just the right side to pretty much gone, only acting up when lifting etc. xrays showed nothing. also had ultra sounds, they didn't call so guess nothing there either. (other than the 3 stones that have been there)

then saturday it started hurting again (red box), it was sorta mild sunday and monday. tuesday morning, lots of spasms and sharp cramps, but unlike before when it would go to 6-8 for few mins then back to zero, it would stay at a annoying 1-2 for 15-30mins. called doctor got appointment for today, then said screw it and did some work around the house for about 4 hours, moved full sheet of sub-flooring, cinder blocks and other stuff with little-mild pain. thinking i just somehow worked this shit out as i finished and back just felt tired, then went up 3 steps and pain hit me like bullet then about 2 mins later it was gone and has been mostly mild but a lot more constant after that.

Intrinsic said:

After a couple of neurological consults, years of PT, shots in the back of my neck, shots in the front, I think after today’s visit I’m going to break down and go for surgery.

My C5-C6 and C6-C7 have degenerated, bulging, foraminal narrowing. Some days it is hard to use my right arm. And we have a baby coming in September and I want to be able to hold the little guy.

Probably going to call and schedule the ACDF tomorrow. He said it can likely be scheduled by 1st of June giving me plenty of recovery time. He seemed pretty bummed about suggesting it to an otherwise healthy 42 year old. But admitted that I’ve tried everything else. I just want full use of my arm back and continue doing things I enjoy like workouts and woodworking and shooting.

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This probably isn't going to fix the underlying cause in the first place and all you'll be doing is delaying the inevitable.

Intrinsic said:

After a couple of neurological consults, years of PT, shots in the back of my neck, shots in the front, I think after today’s visit I’m going to break down and go for surgery.

My C5-C6 and C6-C7 have degenerated, bulging, foraminal narrowing. Some days it is hard to use my right arm. And we have a baby coming in September and I want to be able to hold the little guy.

Probably going to call and schedule the ACDF tomorrow. He said it can likely be scheduled by 1st of June giving me plenty of recovery time. He seemed pretty bummed about suggesting it to an otherwise healthy 42 year old. But admitted that I’ve tried everything else. I just want full use of my arm back and continue doing things I enjoy like workouts and woodworking and shooting.

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I had the discotomy part but not the fusion part years ago. You won’t be doing anymore cliff jumping, but all in all this is a pretty good/easy surgery if done by someone competent with a short recovery time and very limited physio. Preferably a neurosurgeon and not an orthepedix surgeon.

found out have a cyst on one of my kidney, but supposedly low chance of being bad. had mri scheduled for may 1st for my back, but insurance waited till right before to chance their mind on approval. it got bumped to 12th, but got a call from hospital the other day to get more info as insurance still hasn't approved it.
in the last few weeks, had several day where it hasn't hurt that much at all, then go to open a door and feel like got stabbed for a second.

Goatface said:

found out have a cyst on one of my kidney, but supposedly low chance of being bad. had mri scheduled for may 1st for my back, but insurance waited till right before to chance their mind on approval. it got bumped to 12th, but got a call from hospital the other day to get more info as insurance still hasn't approved it.
in the last few weeks, had several day where it hasn't hurt that much at all, then go to open a door and feel like got stabbed for a second.

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Same thing happened to me. Needed some imaging done, take a half day off work, show up and they tell me insurance denied the test. Had to take more time off work to book a follow up visit with the doctor and show up to the rescheduled imaging appointment. Worst thing was I could have gone to another place, paid $400 cash and gone through none of this hassle. Ended up costing $1200 out of pocket since I didn't meet my deductible that year. Thanks assholes.

Kobayashi said:

Worst thing was I could have gone to another place, paid $400 cash and gone through none of this hassle. Ended up costing $1200 out of pocket since I didn't meet my deductible that year. Thanks assholes.

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Not sure if this is what happened to you but hospital facility fees are the biggest scam in Healthcare right now IMO and 90% of doctors don't even realize it.

Buy up a primary care office --> have all your new docs refer all imaging and lab tests to the hospital owned facility for 3-5x what it would have cost at an independent outpatient center.

Kithani said:

Not sure if this is what happened to you but hospital facility fees are the biggest scam in Healthcare right now IMO and 90% of doctors don't even realize it.

Buy up a primary care office --> have all your new docs refer all imaging and lab tests to the hospital owned facility for 3-5x what it would have cost at an independent outpatient center.

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Yep, that's pretty much exactly what happened - I even remember the hospital system's logo getting tacked on their sign. It honestly wouldn't have surprised me if my doctor knew and was getting a kickback, he always seemed to be interested in making an extra buck. He started really heavily pushing Lipitor after one blood test had a slightly above average level for cholesterol - not even in the high range. When things returned to normal in the next check up, he didn't relent because "they could go up again, it'd probably be good to have a prescription ready."

Wife is 37 with high grade dysplasia in all her lady bit area's. I'm assuming it was part of her being unable to have kids, or at least I know she's had one or 2 surgeries removing cysts and such up in there. After they'd done the tests that were coming back abnormal and came up with the dysplasia after the biopsy, she was referred to oncologist.

They explained it as less one step down from cancer as local DR said but more like on a continuum towards cancer, albeit not everyone develops into actual cancer. Didnt have a % for us or anything. Short version is they want her to take HPV vaccine to help reduce chances of other forms of HPV and mutations of what she has now or something, basically said that while it's kinda off label use, he's seen like 20% of people have positive results from getting it.

They also want her on Efudex cream (chemo cream?) applied all up in there as a preventative as well and try and keep the existing issue at bay?

Then finally they were breaching the topic of getting cervix and possibly fallopian tubes all removed. (Ovary too except due to age kinda need for hormone still) Also as a preventative for those commonly developing cancer but of course not ruling out getting it in all the other structures. Silver lining is no more periods I guess.


So I'm pretty medically hesitant, especially since I think the guy was inferring he was pro C 19 shots. But trying to look up stuff such as the HPV thing, mostly get spammed with a lot of what I'd consider the crazy antivaccers that think basic stuff like polio shots are bad.


So looking for overall thoughts perhaps, more immediately is any naysayers against HPV vaccine since she has an appt tommorow for it.

Had a friend who had ovarian cyst burst, and she had to get both ovaries removed. Not a pleasant process. If your wife has something that is known to progress towards cancer then go full speed on doing whatever can be done to prevent it. Obviously your wife is going to have her lines in the sand as to what quality of life she needs to maintain if any of those steps would cross them, but otherwise do what you can to prevent cancer. It is always a shitty way to die. Always.

moonarchia said:

Had a friend who had ovarian cyst burst, and she had to get both ovaries removed. Not a pleasant process. If your wife has something that is known to progress towards cancer then go full speed on doing whatever can be done to prevent it. Obviously your wife is going to have her lines in the sand as to what quality of life she needs to maintain if any of those steps would cross them, but otherwise do what you can to prevent cancer. It is always a shitty way to die. Always.

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Agree with this, but to go a bit further.

In late November 2021 my wife felt a lump in her left breast. She had just finished breastfeeding our daughter within the last year or so. That, combined with her age ( Just turned 40 ) led the docs to believe it was a clogged or inflamed milk duct. They dragged their feet and told her not to worry.

Within a month it was nearly the size of an egg.

Thanks to the slow as molasses health and insurance industry she wasn't formally diagnosed with cancer until some time in January.

At first our plan was to ask the doctors to cut that boob off immediately. But then when we sat down with them they told us that they were confident the chemo would work and because she'd probably want reconstruction at the same time, it would take time to schedule the various surgeons needed (plastic, etc.)

They never really explained that if we had an emergency mastectomy done it would only been a couple of week wait.

We didn't listen to our first instinct and bought what the doctors told us.

She died on Monday at age 41 and I'm here with a 2.5 half year old and 5 year old.

In short, cut all that shit out. I think we all have a desire to believe that we don't need to go with the nuclear option and that things will be OK. And for a lot of people maybe it is. But it wasn't for us and I would tell anyone that it isn't worth the risk.

Sanrith Descartes said:

What a horrible situation. I'm sorry for your loss. One thing I have learned over the years and Covid really drove it home, is that "many" doctors are worthless. If you are semi-intelligent you are better off researching everything a doctor tells you. The Internet has made us all Braniacs.

I'm not saying don't go to doctors, but don't take what they tell you as gospel, look it up yourself. Get a second or third opinion. Oh, and fuck insurance companies. Treat them like adversaries. They don't give a shit about you or your family.

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So much this.

They said it was a probably cyst and we believed them because we wanted so badly to believe them. When what we should have done is the exact opposite.Treated it as the most aggressive cancer the world has ever seen until the biopsy comes back and said otherwise.

Be the pit bull, the squeaky wheel, the advocate.

When they told us the time-frame when we'd been able to see someone close to us we should have just called Dana Farber in Boston right then and there.

It's all Monday Morning Quarterbacking at this point and it's things I'm sure almost everyone looking at this board knows. But we didn't.

KDow said:

So much this.

They said it was a probably cyst and we believed them because we wanted so badly to believe them. When what we should have done is the exact opposite.Treated it as the most aggressive cancer the world has ever seen until the biopsy comes back and said otherwise.

Be the pit bull, the squeaky wheel, the advocate.

When they told us the time-frame when we'd been able to see someone close to us we should have just called Dana Farber in Boston right then and there.

It's all Monday Morning Quarterbacking at this point and it's things I'm sure almost everyone looking at this board knows. But we didn't.

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Our community outreach program consists of Folgers and Bubbles, so we apologize.

Extreme allergies, never had them this bad but no state and new spring. Seems to be grasses but doesn't help that I have a 4 acre field of all kinds of shit I'm out playing in trying to improve into a better hayfield.

Aside from running nose, full on rashes and welts all over.

What can I take or get prescribed that's better than taking 2 benadryll and fighting passing out.