Dear Andrew,
Facet Joint Denervation – Rhizolysis
I was so pleased to have seen you at the Jazz Concert and to be able to give you an update on my recovery since having the Rhizolysis procedure, which is already over a year ago now.
I am sure you will remember that I had lower back pain at L4/5 and that this was due, possibly, to a back injury that I had sustained some time ago and which was most troublesome when I played golf. I had been struggling with this for about 3 years by the time I came to see you and had reached the point where I was going to give up playing as it was no longer a pleasure and quite often I couldn’t make it round a full 18 holes (or even half way) because of the pain and discomfort that I experienced at a particular point in my golf swing. I experienced pain at other times, often first thing in the morning on getting out of bed, but this did not necessarily stop me doing anything and usually eased as the day progressed.
I remember being delighted that your view was that, whilst it might only be a hobby, if it was one of the only ways I had to spend my free time, then it was important that I should be able to continue. Thank you for that understanding at, what was, quite a low point for me. I recall that, at first, you gave me an injection which gave relief from the pain for about a month but which returned after that time. However, this confirmed your diagnosis and informed my decision to have the Denervation treatment. I understand that you used a relatively new procedure call Rhizolysis.
The procedure was carried out in a day at the Winterbourne. The care and attention that I received was excellent, which was very comforting because although it was a relatively quick procedure, it still involved having a general anaesthetic and I was quite anxious about this aspect of the treatment. But everyone was very understanding and took the time to make me feel at ease.
I recall that there was some improvement almost immediately. However, I was a bit sore for the first few days after the procedure (not painfully so, but just sore), so it took nearly a week before I was properly able to evaluate the reduction in pain level on a scale of 1-10. By the time I saw you a week and then a month later, there was a significant improvement in the pain I was experiencing.
However, when I saw you at one month post-op, I was almost disappointed as I did think that, notwithstanding the improvement, I was still not going to be able to play golf and wasn’t convinced that the pain I had experienced in the movement of the lateral slide of my hips through my down swing, had been improved or affected by the treatment enough to return to golf.
However, I am pleased to report that, unexpectedly (on my part at least) the improvement continued after that one month follow up appointment and over the next few weeks, the results of the treatment continued to develop to the point that I am now pain free when I play golf. I worked hard over the following months to put my golf swing back together and am now enjoying a level of consistency in my game that I have not had before. On the whole I do not have any trouble walking the 5 or 6 miles that a round usually covers. I have no pain when swinging a golf club at all.
I am so delighted with the results as I had reached a point of thinking that I was stuck with the back pain and that it was probably going to get progressively worse as I got older.
But this is not the case. Very occasionally I may get a twinge of pain when bending awkwardly or when exercising in the gym, and its times when that happens that I try to be sensible and remember that, if I could feel it, it would probably have been painful at that moment because I am pushing my back to its limit. So I try to be careful but I do still exercise in the gym and run as well, which is also something else that I had had to stop doing prior to having the treatment.
So all in all, a brilliant result and I cannot thank you and your team enough for their care and the treatment that I received from you and the team at the Winterbourne.
Finally, I do hope this isn’t too long, but I wanted to explain to you the nature of how my recovery developed and, whilst there was some immediate effect, the best and most dramatic results seemed to develop more noticeably over the following 4-8 weeks.
I hope the above account is helpful and thank you again to you and your team. With very best wishes
Mrs L.W.
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