I recently received an email from a patient expressing gratitude for the role I played in his recovery story. I asked him to share his story for other patients facing the same questions he had regarding the use of of prolotherapy for a dynamic spondylolisthesis, whether he could return to high level activity without a fusion, and what kind of recovery timeline he could expect.
Here’s is some background. The patient had initially contacted me from out of state after reading a post I made on SI joint dysfunction and the up and down stream effects that segmental instability in the lumbar spine can have on regional mechanics. We spoke and he ended up consulting with me on his case. At this point he had not been moving in the right direction despite visits with two MDs, two PTs, and a DC in his home state over the course of a year. I worked with him on and off over the first year because he was living outside of Washington. When he was in state I provided manual therapy and later consulting on a home exercise program from a far. After about 6 months he moved back to Washington and I was able to provide more focused treatment and coordination of care. In short after 17 visits of PT (over 2 years) and prolotherapy this patient no longer suffers from chronic lower back pain and he avoided a lumbar fusion surgery!
Here is what he had to share about his story.
The pain remained this way for a year and a half and was not responsive to various treatments including physical therapy, extensive rest, massage, and back bracing. Then I started physical therapy with Mitch, at which point the pain began to gradually decrease over the course of a year. However, I still had pain walking and was unable to perform any athletic activities besides biking. This led me to seek prolotherapy from Dr. Musnick. By manual tests, the prolotherapy injections significantly stabilized my spondylolisthesis but did not have an immediate effect on pain.