Can Spinal Tap cause life-long problems?

[sisinky]

Back in May 1987 my husband had injured himself, (pulled muscles in arm), at work. The company rules were to go to ER with any work-related injury, no matter how minor. My husband had a low-grade fever and the ER Dr. observed a mosquito bite on his forehead. The Dr. decided to do a Spinal Tap to rule out meningitis. (We were very young and dumb and figured the Dr. knew what he was doing) The Dr. ended up jabbing him at least 17 times (these were visual punctures, have pictures). Husband ended up with a spinal headache and was admitted to the hospital. A blood-patch was done which did eliminate the headache. Husband lost a lot of physical strength which he never regained. He also has visible scaring from the Spinal Tap attempts.  

[tmc1126]

I had a doctor do this to me in 2016 (13 times) and in 2023 i still have swelling, pain and inflammation.

[Cookie122]

I'm so sorry for your experiences with doctors. You just have to keep to it and keep going to different doctors until you find one that will listen and talk to you like a "normal" person, not one who's "crazy". I do agree with you about it. It seems strange that he was perfectly normal before the tap and after he isn't. Unless they introduced something foreign to his system to cause it, it has to be some sort of damage.

[sisinky]

He has mentioned the spinal tap, headache and patch, most just blow him off, one told him there was no such thing as a spinal headache and/or blood patch to repair it.  He has gotten worse over the years and has been on disability for the last 10. His disability dx is degenerative disk disease and spinal stenosis. It is many years to late for an attorney, I stumbled on to this site and am just curious if his back issues are from the spinal tap as he/we believe, or is he crazy as we've been told (well, maybe I wanted to see if it could be both, LOL) We did get his medical/hospital records concerning the hospitalization following the tap, we got a suprise when we read the records, seems as if the dx on admittance was listed as pneumonia!

[Cookie122]

Have you consulted any other doctors about it? Have you considered talking to a lawyer about medical malpractice although it may be too late? It seems to me that the doctor may have hit a nerve or spinal cord and injured it. Sometimes I guess it can regenerate itself and then sometimes its permanent. Has he gotten better or worse over the years?