8 year old son

[Carmell]

Hi Alrey,

Welcome. Scoliosis in young children is not common. When you mentioned your little one has back pain in the morning, and only a 15 degree curve of the spine, that is a big red flag to me that there is something else causing the back pain, and possibly causing the scoliosis. She needs to have a full-spine MRI to see if there are spinal cord problems. A tethered spinal cord could be causing her discomfort and contributing to the scoliosis. Many things can. The orthos who have brushed you (and her) off aren't seeing the whole picture. Please consider more opinions to help determine the cause of the back pain and scoliosis. Maybe she needs a consultation with a pediatric neurosurgeon.

Good luck and keep us posted.

[LATigner]

I agree with the previous post that you might consider getting another opinion. If your daughter is only 8, she has a lot of growing to do. A 15 degree curve could easily become larger and harder to treat. At her age and curvature, if there is nothing else physically wrong, they are getting excellent results with the SpineCor brace. My daughter's doctor has braced a couple of young children with curves under 20 degrees and gotten them down to 0 or 1 degree in the brace. You might want to check out the SpineCor website, I think it's spinecorporation.com or look at the SpineCor thread under the bracing section of this forum. So many parents regret the "wait & see" course of action because usually the curve gets bigger. I only wish we had know about our daughter's curve when it was 15 degrees instead of finding it at 40 degrees.

[kbw]

Vertebral Stapling Procedure for my 8 year old

Our daughter is almost 8 years old, will be having the vertebral stapling procedure the end of sept. '06 by Dr. Betz at Shriners Hospital. I would like to connect her with some other children who have underwent this same procedure (for supportand even if it is just via email communications). Shes being doing great, but I know this is very hard for her.

My husband and I are also interested to know what the post hospitalizations days were like? Our understanding is that the recovery is quite straight forward, minimal pain, only restriction will be to take it easy, no sports for 1 month. Hospital stay about 3-4 days. Just looking for feedback on initial post-surgery days and what we might expect? Per M.D. and his staff, the kids do great in general with this procedure.

[mariaf]

Hi kbw,

You are in great hands with Dr. Betz. My son, David, who will be 8 in November had the same stapling procedure performed by Dr. Betz's colleague, Dr. D'Andrea, in March of 2004.

I would be happy to share any info, experience, etc. with you - on this forum, or by e-mail. My address is mariaf305@yahoo.com.

It sounds to me as though what Dr. Betz told you is pretty accurate regarding hospital stay, recovery, restrictions, etc.

take care,