Thursday, November 8, 2018

Don't Taze Me Bro'! - Follow up

In an effort to stave off surgery the orthopedic surgeon I saw this week for the carpal tunnel issue stabbed me in the wrist with a VERY long needle. The steroid injection into the carpal tunnel kinda stings at first, that is until the blessed anesthetic kicks in. Fingers were numb for a little over an hour. Made typing interesting.

One thing I found fascinating is how even though the doc was stabbing my wrist I felt the pain in my finger tips and palm. Doc moved the needle a little and that went away but referential pain has always been fascinating.

Another fun bit from the shot was that my thumb, index finger, middle finger, and the inside part of my ring finger were numb for just over an hour. When the doc handed me my paperwork I took it in my left hand and dropped it straightaway.

She told me, “That is what severe symptoms are like.”

My only thought was, “how could someone function like that? I couldn’t.”

The way the decision for the injection was explained to me is that they like to do the injection first because it has a two-fold purpose being both therapeutic as well as diagnostic.

IF the diagnosis of carpal tunnel syndrome is correct the shot will give symptom relief. If the symptoms return sometime in the not too distant future, the shot may be repeated. If the symptoms return again, then that indicates a surgical procedure is likely to be the only permanent option.

IF the diagnosis of carpal tunnel syndrome is wrong the shot will have no effect on the symptoms and further investigation is warranted. (The doc is confident in the diagnosis though and we HOPE that this is not the case.)

So for now I sit and wait for the next couple of weeks to gauge how effective this is going to be. I'm hoping I fall into the small percentage where the shot takes care of it. Knowing my luck though...

Here's hoping I break from my norm.

-Tole

3 comments:

Old NFO said...

Good luck, and referential pain IS an interesting phenomena... :-)

Wayne said...

This post's format is hopelessly screwed. I have been trying to fix it for almost 30 minutes and I've only managed to make it worse. I give up.

Wayne said...

I fixed it! No idea how but somehow a bunch of formatting happened. Clicked the "Remove Formatting" button and viola! Just goes to show that the "mash buttons until something happens" technique is still valid.

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