markov

Wow, Sam. That's an incredible story. When Dave first posted the slides on his website, I was amazed to see the last few that showed you up & about, after seeing the ones that showed your train-wreck of a spine. As a paramedic for over 10 years, I can affirm that indeed, it was some seriously high-quality prehospital care that spared you your mobility. The tiniest bit of "Eh, who cares?" in a logroll, or the placement of the C-collar, or the application of the vacuum splint, could indeed have rendered you paralyzed or worse. Best wishes for a continued recovery with as little pain as possible.

I spent most of last winter skiing with a cast on my arm. It's not precisely the same experience as yours...but nevertheless it worked just fine after I bought a huuge mitt from the sale bin at REI. Currently I'm laid up with a herniated lumbar disk. That's much more disabling and interferes quite a bit more with my ability to get out into the mountains. I get the impression that a positive outlook does wonders for healing time and outcomes, though. Visualize bones fusing .

Congratulations. That's an excellent camera. It's amazing how quickly the technology improves. Enjoy it .

Yeah, I didn't even need the fluff(er?) article to sell me. Those look awesome. Only the women's ski seems light, and even then, not superlight.

Next time he should just choke the chicken instead.

Thanks - I don't know how I missed that. Even though there's a ton of 'objective' medical evidence circulating on the internet (and in med school libriaries), anecdotes from people who ask similar things of their bodies afterwards are very valuable. Leg pain (profound. intense.), leg numbness, occasionally feeling like my leg is in a breath mint commercial, inability to stand for more than a minute or two. as I have for about 15 years. This is radically and fundamentally different. I've even had sciatica as a component of my back pain, but this ain't that (with regard to the quality and intensity of the symptoms). Well, if they're associated, they're associated. The question is whether they're causally related, and in that regard it's true that MRIs are neither perfectly sensitive nor perfectly specific. My MRI is attached, and the lesion on the film is an anatomic match to the pattern of the pain, in this case. Exactly. That's why, mathematically the performance (in this case the specificity of this test, or avoiding false positives) of the test improvies when the population being tested has a greater prevalance of the disease in question. In other words, it's the right test to do when you have symptoms that indicate an underlying condition that can be evaluated. In the absence of symptoms, you're guaranteed to get true negatives or false positives. That would suck! Though I agree. Modern procedures (such as microdiskectomy) have a greater long-term success rate (>90%) than any of the older procedures (laminectomy, diskectomy, fusion, etc). ...Thats's me! True. I've sought non-interventional care for mine for the past 15 or so years, but now this is different. Thanks for taking the time to reply with your thoughts (and thanks to the posters on the previos threads, which I somehow missed in my search.

Thanks for all your excellent and insightful advice. I'm going to get an epidural steroid injection next week and see if that helps. Although I was super-resistant to it initially, I ended up taking some oral corticosteroids last week and they really worked. That leads me to believe that local application of the same drug will have a good effect. In any case, thanks for the replies. I think 'letting go' of this ski season will probably be mentally helpful. Then, if I make it back before March it will be a bonus. I'd be happy with the early March pow and the late March corn.

Have any of you been through treatment (surgical or non-surgical) for a herniated disk? I have a decent-sized one at L4-L5, and am most interested in an option that will allow me to have a winter ski season, even if it starts in January. I could wait it out and continue with the acupuncture, meds & physical therapy, but I'm interested in whether anyone has climbing or skiing-specific insight into recovery from this injury, or recovery from surgery such as microdiskectomy. Thanks for your insights.

I got some AT boots at Second Ascent in Ballard pretty cheaply in June. I don't know if they still have any, but they had a whole bunch of new AT boots in various sizes, and a half dozen or so used pairs (at the time). If you call they're usualy pretty good about telling you whether they have any, to save you an unnecessary trip.

I think this is one of those situations where, if everything goes well in a variety of situations, a private rescue party could do a sufficient job. But it's when the 'unexpected' occurs that it's helpful to have backup for your backup. What if a rescue party of three is sent and it turns out there are 2 (or more) non-ambulatory victims (and no bystander helpers)? Calling the next friend on the list will take a whole lot longer than calling incident command at the trailhead. But creating a rule that only parties of a certain size will go on rescues will delay and probably derail many rescue attempts before they begin. Advanced Life Support (IVs, meds, etc.) is something else that would be impossible to administer without a physician on-site, since even a paramedic with a killer first aid kit would be without the oversight of 'Medical Control' while on a 'private' rescue mission. It's not always necessary (or available, even with 'offical' rescue parties), but if I had a collapsed lung, I'd sure want someone nearby with a big needle and the skillz to use it. Lastly, unless I misread the original post, the spouse wouldn't know if the slip resulted in a broken ankle, or a broken femur. If I was sitting on a ledge looking at my femur poking out through my thigh, I'd sure hope my wife was dialing 3 numbers instead of 7.

I have some Fritschi Freerides, which climb pretty well, and ski great, but are heavy. A buddy has the Naxo bindings, which he loves, though they appear to be harder to find. If I had it to do again I'd probably get the Fritschi Diamirs, which are lighter than the Freerides.

I was surprised to see the answer to the question about whether 'anyone' has done a 1-day ascent of Everest. Seems kind of condescending, dismissive, and ethnocentric - but maybe I'm misreading the tone of the reply. I would say the answer to that question is "Yes."

As a volunteer ski patroller at another mountain I can say from my own experience that boundary enforcement pretty much sucks. I avoid it at all costs. Of course, all of the Crystal patrollers are paid employees (they don't have any vollies) so I guess they'll have to do what they're told. I definitely think that when people see the red jacket & white cross they should think "rescue" not "cop"...but it looks like the winds of change are blowing the other way at CM.

Anecdotal evidence is generally considered weak in medicine...but...here's mine anyway: Acupuncture. I had exactly the pain you described for a couple of months. It was getting pretty depressing. But for me - acupuncture really worked. That sort of condition is right up their alley.

At the risk of being pessimistic: did you probe for Roy? Stranger things have happened. Any other debris besides the tent?