I found Dr. Melamed from having seven people in my little town of Tehachapi, in the mountains east of Bakersfield, tell me how they had either saved their lives and then fixed failed surgeries, worked on daughters, sisters, fathers. And so I thought, geez, seven people, I need to check this guy out, even though I had already interviewed six other spine doctors.
I made my trip from Tehachapi down to Marina del Rey to meet with with Dr. Melamed, and so I had my initial consultation and had decided pretty much I wanted to go with him, which I’ll explain in a minute why. But the problem I had was my insurance. I was with an HMO, so I had to wait till I could switch out.
But Dr. Melamed told me that I had two conditions going on in my back. One was stenosis, which he categorized as critical, and also spinal [inaudible], which is the slippage of my L3 and 4, and that he could fix those. My symptoms were excruciating pain, so I had pain in my left side that was relentless, never went away for the last year, and I had problems with it on and off for about 10 years. But couldn’t stand to even wash the dishes, shop, I couldn’t stand at all.
And so what he did was what he called Roto-Rooter [inaudible], stenosis, and then did a fusion between L3 and 4. And it’s been seven weeks and I have zero pain. He thought he could maybe do 75 to 80% [inaudible] get rid of the pain, but he got rid of a 100%, and I feel like I had my life back. And I could literally cry, because I’m very active, do a lot of sports and activities, and I feel like there’s a chance at being able to do a lot of that again.
The other reasons why I decided to go with him was also, you know, when I saw him the second time, when I was ready to go on, I had the right insurance, he didn’t change the plan on me. I had a couple doctors, when I saw him the second time, they were going to do something totally different, which make me lose confidence in them. And then when I had a question about my surgery, he called me at 8:30 that same night, a week before my surgery, after he finished a long surgery, and answer to all my questions, so I was comfortable going forward.
So this is turned out far better than I ever expected. It’s been a great experience. The front desk has been good, the hospital was fabulous. I went to Marina del Rey, and I’m telling you, you push that button and there’s a nurse there right away. So everything from start to finish was better than I ever anticipated. I’m very happy and I’m looking forward to the rest of my life now.
