Can i ask how old you are? the short of it is you are always going to have some impairment, it depends a bit on how bad the DDD, the bulges ,and the arthritis are ,and on how many vertebrae are affected ,pain management (medication ) ,facet joint injections, and possibly surgery are some of the things that may be recommended to you. Make sure you have good doctors, and get a second opinion before surgery.

all the best gman66

Male, 41 years of age.

A grade V annular tear on the modified Dallas Discogram scale is what you are experiencing. It may or may not be painful, but if it is, its because of ingrowth of neural tissue into the central part of the disc (normally the central disc has no nociceptive pain sensors or nerves). Such tears are not commonly seen unless the disc is painful, but demonstrating the pain produced on discography is sometimes difficult since the contrast dye injected may simply run out through the annular tear without permitting pressurization of the disc as is required with discography.
The use of another disc as a control is absolutely imperative ....so if you only had one disc injected, then your discogram results are highly suspect.

Hello Algosdoc,

A question if I may - What are "nociceptive pain sensors". Or perhaps did you mean "nonreceptive pain sensors"? I'll appreciate your clarification.

Thanks

RichT

Nociception is the process of pain transmission through nerve endings or pain sensors. That is different than neuropathic pain which is a burning pain and is associated with nerve inflammation.

Hello Algosdoc,

Thanks for the "enlightenment". You are acquainting me with medical terms I never heard before, let alone understand.

Talk about a steep learning curve from your posts. LOL Thats okay, never too old to learn.

Know what amazes me? - How you as a doctor have time during the day to give your input on this forum. In my area, the docs are running from one room to another so fast that one barely gets time to ask any questions.

Have a GREAT Day!

RichT

41 you are still fairly young. It sounds like you are still going through an evaluation period. I don't think you can expect a doctor to fix everything up for you, however there may be a course of action that they can take can improve your situation a lot,
one thing that is not often mentioned is that the spine needs to be exercised so the disks remain healthy, and arthritis is kept at bay, this is hard because most of us with back trouble are in pain and exercise makes it worse, ask your doctors what they think you are capable of, hopefully they are interested in this aspect of your health and know how to help. You might have to take it easy until after your evaluation is finished and some kind of intervention has taken place. You may have to see a number of health care professionals in your fight to get some relief be patient and persistent and always make sure your doctors are good sorry if this sounds like a lecture i can only really guess about your situation i am just trying to cover all the bases.