Hear our patients share their stories about their
experiences with Dr. Jatana and his practice.
James first started having neck pain symptoms at age 51. Initially, he thought the symptoms would pass in a day or two. Instead the pain began to radiate into his left hand with numbness — an emergency symptom implying a herniated disc was pressing on a nerve with the potential to cause permanent numbness.
Carlton tracks the beginning of his 10 year neck problem back to a ski accident. As a retired physical therapist, he successfully managed his pain symptoms non-surgically for 10 years with exercises and stretches. The neck problem, however, returned after a car accident where he was a passenger in a car that was totaled. His symptoms worsened to sharp stabbing pain in the neck and shoulder, along with numbness in his hand. As a therapist he knew surgery might be unavoidable.
In 2013, Lori Lewis was involved in a serious rollover accident that left her with a severe neck injury. Within days of the accident, pain began to take hold in her neck, shoulder and left arm. The neck pain led to headaches and her left arm eventually became so weak she had trouble grasping or lifting anything without pain. Household and work-related tasks such as washing dishes or lifting a ream of copy paper, became impossible.
Scott Ruppenthal was in the midst of a workout when he felt something snap. Initially, Scott thought he’d torn a muscle in his shoulder. The next day, however, he felt a burning sensation in his right arm and turned to his primary care physician for help. Oral steroids provided a week’s worth of relief, but when the pain returned, Scott knew he needed to investigate further. Eventually, an MRI revealed bulging discs in Scott’s neck.
Bill Stahl is an ultra marathoner who has competed in the grueling Leadville 100 seven times. He recently marked his fourth finish and even though he came in last, it’s a feat he won’t soon forget. That’s because less than six months earlier Bill, who also serves as coach of Littleton High School’s cross country team, could barely move his neck, let alone run.
For Mike Dobbs, chronic back pain had become a way of life. He spent a decade avoiding social events or trips to the grocery store because anything that required long periods of standing aggravated the pain. For awhile, cortisone injections provided anywhere from two to six months of relief. But eventually, the shots became more ineffective and Mike got to the point where he couldn’t even take a shower without enduring intense pain.
Kim Uselman jokes that she has a “punchcard” with Dr. Jatana, who has performed five neck and back surgeries on Kim in the past 16 years. A lumbar micro discectomy in 1999, another one in 2001 after a re-injury, an L4-5 microdiscectomy in 2003, a C5-7 cervical discectomy in 2007 and a C4-5 fusion in 2014.
Very gradually, I started experiencing an ache in my right arm and a very subtle loss in strength. At first, I thought I just had lactic acid built up in my arm. I dropped a ten-pound weight and did not have the strength to do a bench press. I actually fell off the bench – that’s when I knew I had a problem.
I have a long history of cervical spine issues that began when I broke my neck in a car accident at the age of 19 and had a fusion to stabilize my neck. In the years since, I’ve experienced successive degeneration and eventually had another fusion done. I have a peripheral nerve stimulator that helps immensely with neck pain, but I was starting to have more neurologic symptoms that were difficult to figure out and pain that the nerve stimulator couldn’t help.
In March 2013, I developed a stiff neck that quickly turned into some arm pain. My primary care doctor put me on a regimen of oral steroids, pain medication and physical therapy – all of which I did, but to no avail. During a vacation to Florida, my pain started getting worse and I had an MRI, which showed a rupture of a cervical disc and nerve compression.
