Out of solution
 

Hi,
I tried about everything to cure my back pain
Have been able to remain active with precaution
( golf, stair master, weight training )


But in the last five weeks things went very bad; now I can't sit more than a few minutes at a time without pain, even a 15 minute walk is a challenge.

As a resident of Ontario, access to surgery is long and difficult, if you are retired and not an urgent case (meaning you are not about to paralyze or wet your pants).

I'm shopping for a surgeon in Buffalo area.

Any advice anyone?

Are you capable financially of going to Europe? With you already near the east coast, it's a shorter set of hops for you. I recognize your sitting tolerance is a problem but you could check out first class and use the reclining seat options. If you can manage a Americas to UK hop, you have the possibility of taking trains the rest of the way and may even be able to book sleepers for a large fraction of the travel. It would be draining travel but you have the option of breaking it up and resting in hotels. That's the only other option that springs to mind over looking for surgeons within the US.

FWIW - IMHO:
R2D2....I too am a Canuck from Vancouver Island and you are going to be extremely disappointed and waste a good deal of your life in Canada or the USA. Go to German or Spain and get it done properly.
Yes it's expensive......'bout the price of a nice car.......but so is your life priceless....

The WORST thing medically that could happen to you in Canada is a back issue......that was the sobering advice from my GP.

There are doctors in NY and almost every other US state that have been practicing for disc replacement since 2001.

I would look for those doctors who started with the Charite or ProDisc trials. Also, use the search function above. I'll see what I can find...

See this topic and doctor herein:

https://www.adrsupport.org/forums/sh...hlight=Buffalo

Thanks everyone for your advice

Anybody have have an idea how long to get an appointment with Dr Clavel?
How to start the process?

Thanks again

Dr. Clavel
 

Contact him through his website: http://www.doctorclavel.com/en-us

Upload your information to Yolanda. She will email you back after you contact her through his website and tell you what to do.

I started in May of last year and it took about 5 weeks for them to get back to me once they had the completed package. Summer is a very busy time for Dr. Clavel! He told me last week he is taking his vacation in August so, expect a three week delay then. I would get started now if you don't want to wait until the fall for an answer.

I just got back from Spain this past Saturday after having a three level ADR done on my neck by Dr. Clavel. It was the best decision of my life! It took a long time to figure it out. I posted everything in two very long threads on the ADR Board on how I came to the decision. I also posted a thread in the post surgery forum discussing my recent surgery.

Good luck!

R2,
I am in Buffalo and happy to share my experience with you. Locally I would see Dr. Cappuccino, I have my follow up appt with him today. I had 3 level (S1/L5,L5/L4,L4/L3) with Dr5. Bierstedt 7/16/13 and feel I am doing very well. Seeing that we are neighbors PM me and we can set up a time to talk or even meet.
Todd

Hi,

Another Canuck here, Manitoba. As a Canadian you'll probably have to pay out of pocket for the surgery. When I made the call I looked at the US and Europe. Europe had the better price and seemed to have an edge over the US with experience. (many from the US go to Europe). You need to get an MRI if you haven't already. And you need the actual MRI images, from then on you can send the images to doctors that do back surgery. I, myself went to Dr. Bierstedt, but I'd send them to Dr. Clavel and TBI and a few others.

Good Luck