Merry Christmas-- :(

[rocckyd]

Well, it looks like I will be having surgery yet again. Saw the dr. down at Duke and returned to speak with my OS back at home. As most of you know, back in Feb. I had a bilateral arthroplasty. At the time, the surgery was a success. As most of you also know, I have rheumatoid arthritis-which is just eating away at the joints. We were hoping the cleaning out the diseased tissues would be enough to slow everything down. Unfortunately, that is not the case. If it had been just plain old joint damage-the procedure back in Feb. would have put an end to the problem. Things felt pretty good there for a whle. Now, the opening is back down to 21mm. Plus, the inflammation in the jaw and the tight muscles, are really messing with the neck. I had multiple MRI's these past few weeks, and the neck is really taking a beating. Anywere a joint is under excess stress, the RA just settles itself right in. Plus, I have had to come off one of the mainline meds due to intersticial(spelling?) lung disease(also caused by the RA). All these factors, is just causing the jaw joints to become worse by the day. The last thing I want to do is have a joint replacement. My OS agrees and is trying to prevent this. The plan is to go in on Dec 23rd and to clean out the diseased tissues again. He wants to use a thicker splint following the surgery to prevent the joint from scarring down. He did say that if things look really bad, he will send me to Richmond to look at a partial or total replacement. The main benefit there being that a synthetic joint won't be affected by the RA.

The Dynasplint idea was tossed around and then rejected. Both drs feel that the splint is beneficial when it is a muscle issue/not the actual joint. My OS mentioned that even when I have been knocked out in the office, he can't get movement in the jaw-so, it is not muscular. Kinda disappointed, I was hoping the splint would be a less invasive option.

So, the dr. is hoping that I will be discharged by Christmas. He really wanted me to do this within the next two weeks. All the docs (what I call the "Cast of Thousands" are worried about the degeneration in the neck. But, I don't have the time off to give. It would be two weeks without pay-not an option. I have 2 weeks off for Christmas, so while the timing is no fun, at least it will save me a paycheck.