help with financing an mri?
Does anyone know if there are any programs designated to helping with the cost of an MRI? By helping I mean either a state funded charity kind of thing, loans to be paid back or anything. I have been out of work for over a year because I suddenly became unable to walk, well it was just excruciating to take a step. I went to the local clinic and they told me that it was sciatica which was probably due to some sort of pressure on the sciatic nerve, gave me a handful of pills and told me to go home and rest for a couple of weeks on heat and ice therapy. This eased it quite a bit, however whenever I began doing any sort of moving around, the pain came back. I went back to the clinic and they gave me more pills, a shot of steroids and again told me to rest. It was suggested that maybe a chiropractor or massage therapist may be of some help. I went to a chiropractor about 3 or 4 times and the pain was not going anywhere, so I decided to save my sixty dollar back crack..lol.. Then I went to a hospital one morning when I couldn’t stand it any longer (this was about 4 months after the initial diagnoses of sciatica), I explained to the doc on call that I couldn’t afford a doctor and came at a ‘slow’ time in hopes that they could help me. He was rather cold and said that without an MRI which would cost 00, there really wasn’t much they could do besides give me a handfull of pills, a shot and tell me to rest with ice and heat therapy. I was more hoping that he could point me in the right direction to somewhere that I could get this so needed MRI, but no. I then found a hospital that provided charity care and they had helped me a few times in their ‘non-emergency’ department by giving me shots, pills and this time, an X-Ray. They saw me a couple of times but said that I would need to find a Pain Management specialist to provide ongoing care. I then found a pain management specialist that was referred by many of the offices that I had called and made an appointment. My first visit went great! He listened to what I had to say when I explained what was going on, went over my X-Rays with me and showed me that I had arthritis in my SI joint, some disc degeneration and that my bottom vertebrae were closer than the rest which would indicate some sort of bulging disc or smashed smushy thing that is in between the vertebrae (I am not very good at explaining in medical terms). He put me on some medications, one was an anti-inflamatory, one was a pain killer, one was an anti-spasmatic and the other was to relax the nerves or muscles. He said that the next visit we would more than likely do a spinal injection that involved using a needle to put some kind of numbing stuff on the SI joint to trickle down and see if that took the pain away and that this would give him a better idea of how to treat this ailment and later on talk about a brace if needed. The mere words ‘spinal injection’ scared the tar out of me but I was willing to do anything to get rid of this pain… Please keep in mind that I do not have insurance and all of these visits are paid with cash (5 for the first visit not including the extra 0 for the meds). The second visit I went in to see him a few days early because I couldn’t stand the pain and didn’t want to go to the hospital for a shot if he was going to do one during the visit. I got there on time (9:30 was the appointment and I was there 15 minutes early to check in) and they put me in an exam room. It was 10:30 before the doctor came in, asked how I was doing and I told him how bad it was hurting. He acted like he had never seen me before, said he didn’t know what he was treating and that my X-Rays looked ‘ok’ from the notes he took during the first visit. I asked about the shot, at least for a bit of relief from this pain and he said he didn’t want to do it because I didn’t get an MRI yet, but would increase my medications and told me not to straddle anything like a motorcycle or go 4-wheeling (he said that he couldn’t follow me around to make sure I wasn’t lifting anything or doing anything to irritate it more and I told him that I wasn’t and that was really aggravating because I am a 41 year old active woman! Or at least I was until a year ago). Then he offered to call a few places to see if they could work out a payment plan on this procedure. He left then came back and said that there were a couple of places but I would have to call them, he would leave the numbers with the receptioninst. This literally broke my spirits and I started crying and told him that I couldn’t afford this and have been everywhere to try and get some decent health care and that he was the one that everyone recommended. (I even wrote to the state of Alabama and they actually did sound concerned and gave me a list of insurance companies to call but told me to tell them that I had already had this ‘unknown’ condition.) As soon as my tears started to fall, he stood and asked me to follow him. I was hoping he was going to be
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I do not think you have grasped what is going on. First every Human over the age of 30 will have DDD Degenerative Disc Disease, not a disease but part of the normal aging process. The discs between the vertebra are like a donut and as we age they dehydrate, thereby shrinking. The space between the vertebra, gets smaller, but this is normal. By the time we hit 65, we have no space left! As this happens we get Osteoarthritis, once known as ‘wear and tear’ again can be age related, a slow process, starts at 25-30 years of age.
Sciatica is a relatively common form of low back pain and leg pain, the true meaning of the term is often misunderstood. Sciatica is a set of symptoms rather than a diagnosis for what is irritating the root of the nerve, causing the pain. This point is important, because treatment for sciatica or sciatic symptoms will often be different, depending upon the underlying cause of the symptoms.
Although sciatica is common, a 2008 review of clinical trials said there are no good treatments for it.
I have a prolapsed disc, spent several weeks in a wheelchair, because it hit the nerve root, causing pain, weakness and so on. However, given enough time, it dehydrated and I am now up and walking again. However, now and agin the disc hits the nerve root and pain severe enough to make me pass out cold for a few hours. The Physician has me on Fentanyl, to help with the everyday pain, but nothing stops it when the nerve root is involved. Moreover I have never had any sciatic type pain. A MRI will reveal bones and soft tissue including discs, but the Doctor will know from what you have told him, the situation. I was not offered any spinal injection, I was given a back brace only for driving the car and then the treatment is ‘exercise’. Like you I ended up in ER and they missed the diagnosis, so I eventually ended up paying for a MRI. All it proved was that this pain was not in my ‘mind’ and I have this prolapsed disc, but as for treatment, zero. It took me two years to save up the cash for the MRI, but I was determined to do it, as when the pain arrived I litrally lost my legs. I am now at high risk of loosing not only my legs, but my bowel and bladder control, but ‘untill’ that happens, they are ‘not’ going to remove the disc. So, the MRI was, well outside of the diagnosing the problem and proving it was not in my mind, of little use. Best of Luck