This is my story. I experienced excrutiating back pain for several days in
the middle of August,
while on holiday in France. Upon my return home I visited my doctor who
said I had pulled a muscle! The next day I realised that I was not walking
properly and saw another doctor who sent me for an emergency MRI scan. The
scan results were not good and I was transferred to a neurological hospital.
However, the neurosurgeons were absolutely convinced that I had a spinal
tumour and I underwent a spinal cord biopsy after a week of tests in
hospital.
No evidence of a tumour was found and as the doctors now had no idea what
was wrong they brought in a neurologist for another opinion as well as
giving me another MRI scan which showed great improvement. This neurologist
diagnosed myelitis immediately and I was sent home as I was now walking much
better. I was told virtually nothing about myelitis and got most of my info
from these pages for which I am very grateful.
Several days later, the back pain began again and after a week I was
readmitted to hospital as my symptoms had worsened. This time my MRI scan
showed inflammation right the way down the spinal cord. I was treated with
intravenous steroids followed by 5 days of intravenous immunoglobulin. At
this point I could not stand up and needed a catheter.
I have improved a great deal since this time, walk like a robot but have no
pain and no other symptoms and no longer take any medication. Thank you so
much for all the help on this list as it is so difficult to find information
anywhere else.
Angela Hawkins