Doctor uses new procedure that patients say works

A new surgical technique has been developed by a Cape Girardeau neurosurgeon that promises to do a better job of reducing pain and dysfunction for people who suffer with disabling back problems.

It also seems to get them back on their feet faster than traditional back surgeries, said Dr. Joel Ray, who has been performing the surgery for more than three years. Using medical devices already common in back surgeries, Ray says he is simply using them differently to get better results.

"The goal is to get the patient happy and functional," Ray said last week. "Lots of procedures can usually do one, the other or a little bit of both. This surgery seems to be able to do them both better."

The technique works by fusing -- or connecting -- injured disc spaces more quickly and at a higher success rate than other methods, Ray said. It does so, he said, without the need for screw and rod implementation that complicates other back surgeries.

In fact, of the 80 people who have had the surgery, Ray said CAT scans showed that 79 were fused within six weeks to three months. Metal instrumentation makes it more difficult to know the amount of fusion because the metal creates X-ray noise.

The patients go back to work faster and are frequently pain free, unlike in some other surgeries, which take months to heal from and still leave patients with significant pain, Ray said. The only one who didn't recover completely wasn't wearing his brace, Ray said.

Pain 'too much to bear'

Raymond Scherer, a 64-year-old farmer in Scott City, had back pain so bad that he couldn't get around very well. But then his family doctor referred to Ray.

"It was too much to bear," Scherer said. "After my surgery, the pain was gone right away. Before the surgery, I couldn't walk 100 feet. Now I can walk and do my exercises and still go out and feed the cows."

The technique is so novel that Ray presented the idea to the Congress of Neurological Surgeons last week in Philadelphia. Ray sent a poster that explained the surgery with photos and graphics.

The technique uses an implanted "electrical bone growth stimulator." The degenerative disc is removed and cadaver bone "spacers" are tapped into place in the disc space of the segment of spine to be fused.

In previous procedures, a small microvolt battery was placed in the body and thin wires are laid along the spinal column and the battery provides electrical stimulation that causes the new bone to fuse with the existing bone.

What Ray does, however, is place wires inside the disc space of the spinal column.

"It's simple," Ray said. "It's not like, 'Hey, look what Doc did.' I just tried moving the wire to a slightly different location, and it seems to be working."

Because the wire is better connected to the spine, it better connects the bone and causes it to heal faster, Ray said.

As for what his peers at the convention will think, Ray thinks they will be optimistic.

"They hope it's true, but will certainly need to see this data for themselves to believe it. We have started a prospective study of the outcomes."

Tracy Davied, a physical therapist for Restart in Sikeston, has been working with Dr. Ray's patients for years. She has helped patients recover from both kinds of surgery.

"The result is better, no question," Davied said. "They are returning to labor jobs faster."

Recovery from the surgery includes wearing a protective back brace that sort of looks like a turtle's shell, she said. After wearing that for several weeks, they can switch to a corset-type brace.

'It got rid of my pain'

Shirley Black of Charleston, Mo., was in the hospital for a same-day surgery last week to get the battery removed. The 67-year-old secretary raved about the surgery.

"I had felt excruciating pain in my back and my lower left side," she said. "It was unbearable."

But Black was diagnosed with osteoporosis and was referred to Ray who recommended the surgery.

"I have no back pain at all now," Black said. "I've done really well. It's great. I was back to work in a few months. I don't know if it's a surgery that's going to catch on. All I know is that it got rid of my pain, and it was a pain I couldn't take."

Her daughter, Judy Duemme, said her mother seems like a new person.

"I thought this is it, when she first told me," Duemme said. "I didn't think she'd ever be the same, but now she moves faster than me."

Ray knows it won't help all the patients.

"But I love it when it does," he said.

smoyers@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 137