There are surgeries to give people artificial knees and artificial hips. Now doctors hope they can offer a similar operation to those with back problems. The FDA has approved a new device for artificial disc replacement surgery.
Forty-four-year-old Roxy McGrath of Welch is the first Minnesotan to get the surgery. For her, walking used to be nearly impossible. But just one month after her surgery, she reunites with the nurses at St. Joseph?s hospital in St. Paul who helped her through it. As she walks toward them, she exclaims, ?Look at me! I can move!?
Roxy injured her back lifting boxes at work just over a year ago. She says, ?The pain in my leg would be so unbearable. You just, you couldn't walk. I couldn't sit.? She couldn?t work, or even walk to the end of her driveway for that matter. An avid Viking fan since she was a child, she had to miss out on training camp and going to games this year. She says living with the pain was very depressing.
Roxy was a candidate for spinal fusion but then heard that artificial disc replacement surgery would be available so she waited until this January 31. That?s when a surgeon replaced Roxy's bad disc with an artificial disc called the Charite device. It allows her a full range of motion which she would not have had she had traditional spinal fusion.
Orthopedic spine surgeon Dr. Paul Hartleben performed the surgery. ?I think the results for total disc replacements are going to be very similar to the hips and knees, as the future develops.? It's not a simple procedure. A surgeon must go through the abdomen, moving organs out of the way, to get to the spine. And it isn?t for everyone. Candidates for spinal fusion surgery may qualify. But some doctors prefer patients take a non-surgical approach instead.
To Roxy, it was worth it. She laughs as she says, ?As soon as I woke up from surgery, the first thing I wanted to do was stand. I had to know. I had to know, is it gone? The pain was gone and it was? I'm like?it was just gone! It was amazing!?
So Roxy no longer needs what she called her ?best friends,? a walking cane and medication. She?s back to who she used to be, a lively mother of two who can?t wait for the Viking season to start. ?Absolutely, I'll be at training camp and I'll be at a game. I?m like looking up tickets already.?
For more information on the artificial disc replacement surgery being done at St. Joseph's, St. John's and Woodwinds Hospitals in the metro area, click here.
By Renee Tessman, KARE 11 News
(Copyright 2005 by KARE. All Rights Reserved.)
