studies showed that the man had adhesive basal arachnoiditis. He was treated with a course of oral steroids with no response. Over the next few months his neurological status remained stable except for the evolution of a right sixth nerve palsy. He continued to work and remained ambulatory and otherwise functional in his daily activities.

This gentleman’s problems occurred when iophendylate injected via lumbar puncture was allowed to ascend into the cervical region during myelography. Unfortunately, the contrast was not removed after completion of the procedure. Symptoms of basal arachnoiditis developed two years after the procedure was performed.

Weight loss—Most patients tend to gain weight, especially in the beginning when the pain becomes severe and life-styles become more sedentary. But weight loss and the inability to regain it occurs in many people with arachnoiditis. In most cases, weight loss occurs in later stages of the disease. Weight loss is a problem in animals administered Pantopaque. (15)*

Depression—Due to the severity of pain and other problems experienced by people with arachnoiditis, depression is common. They feel degraded by medical professionals who usually do not understand the pain they are suffering. In the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine (Volume 83, 1990), IHJ Bourne stated, “In many instances doctors, relatives, and friends fail to realize that the pain can be as bad as terminal cancer without the prospect of death to end the suffering.” So it is no wonder that arachnoiditis sufferers become depressed when they are called “drug addicts” and placed in detoxification centers that take one of their only forms of relief—narcotics medications—away from them. They are frequently labeled as drug seekers when they ask for medications to relieve the pain. They don’t mind being monitored by compassionate physicians who are willing to prescribe drugs that help their pain. People with arachnoiditis don’t want to get “high,” they only want to feel as normal as possible again. Until researchers find non-narcotics that work, narcotics are the only thing they have to rely on.

Animals administered Pantopaque. (15) Even when the depression subsided, it came back again. People with arachnoiditis experience depression every time they have a massive flair-up or when they see doctors who know virtually nothing about clinically significant arachnoiditis, and they feel degraded by doctors who can’t comprehend why they just can’t “get on with their lives.”

TREATMENTS

The standard treatment of clinically significant adhesive arachnoiditis is the implanted spinal cord stimulator. In cases where the pain is especially severe, implanted depth brain stimulation may be used. (4, 10) More and more people with arachnoiditis now have the intrathecal infusion pump. Morphine, Dilaudid, Baclofen or another medication is used in the pump to control pain and other problems. Before the pump is implanted, the patient is tested to see if it will work and if the drug can be tolerated. Another incision is made in the spine and a tube is inserted. A portable pump containing morphine or another drug is attached to the tubing. The patient is then monitored for several days. If the pain subsides, the pump is surgically implanted in the abdomen. The downside to the pump is that once [Continued on Next Page]

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