Still Hunting and Farming 15 Years After Neck Surgery

A cow injured Ed Slack's neck fifteen years ago, but got disc cage fusion surgery right after. He's still pain-free, flexible and back to working on the farm with his cows.

I’m Ed Slack from Guthrie, Kentucky. First met Dr. McCord in the mid 90s. I was helping a neighbor with their cows. A cow kicked the gate, hit me in the shoulder, knocked me back and hit a 6x6 post. The next day my arm went numb. I came to Nashville to see a Dr. Davis, it was an emergency-type service. He switched me over to Dr. McCord, and that was the first time I had met him. The surgery he did at the time was taking C6 and C7 out, put a disc cage in. Took bone off my hip, put in the cage causing it to fuse, and everything did fine. I saw him two or three times over three or four years, he released me.

Didn’t see him again until three years ago. I was riding a four wheeler, I could start feeling pain in my arm again. Within a few days I had some numbness. I came back to Dr. McCord and he had a new open upright MRI. I had no idea what this was. Instead of a tunnel, you sit down in an upright position and they take the pictures just like an enclosed MRI. You hear the same sounds and noises, but you’re sitting up. You can TV or listen to music.

The most interesting part of that MRI was the way they took pictures of my neck. After they did the general positions, they’d position my neck in nine positions. They’d start at the very back, take a picture, keep tilting forward, keep tilting forward, then your head points down. He could tell by looking at those pictures where the disc was causing more pain on the nerve. I went into his office the next day and he said, “Look at this.” He flipped a switch a just like that the images of my head and neck were moving, bending back and forth. It was the most fascinating thing that an MRI could show that kind of motion. That surgery was done within the next two or three weeks, came out of it doing perfect. I was back shooting my shotgun, hunting, working on the farm, working at my job at the bank. I have had no problems since then. I would recommend to anybody to see Dr. McCord not only from a good surgical standpoint, but also using the open MRI.

When Dr. McCord fixes you, it’s fixed.

I had a cage in both disc areas. Once we had this third one he took the previous two cages out and a cage in on both sides. When Dr. McCord fixes you, it’s fixed. My first surgery was 15 years ago, still holding fine. The second surgery I had was on a second disc, C5-6 and it’s still holding good!