Before receiving surgery from Dr. Thapar, Frances Straskowski was experiencing severe lower back pain which went down her left leg. She could hardly walk, was not sleeping, was missing a lot of work. She was unable to take care of her husband who was disabled, or do things with her grandchildren. “I got to where I didn’t go anywhere because I just was in so much pain all the time,” she recalls.
After evaluating her condition, in two operations on successive days, Dr. Thapar replaced one of Frances’s discs and then fused the L4-5 vertebrae.
“Actually when my husband and I went to see him after he had done my MRI originally, he looked at my husband and he said, ‘I seriously don’t know how she’s even still walking.’ He was so compassionate. He explained everything to us in detail including all the risks that were involved in doing the procedure. He told us what he was doing, why he was doing it the way he was and answered all of our questions, even questions we didn’t even know we needed to ask him. When it was time for me to go in for my surgery I was so happy because I just knew that I was going to have a good outcome. His bedside manner is awesome. He and his assistant Jolene and the whole team are just awesome people. I really couldn’t have asked for a better person to take care of me.”
“Now I don’t have any more pain, and I’m able to do everything I could do before without any pain. It’s like a miracle. I was so afraid that I would be in pain with my back and everything for the rest of my life, but I’m not. I’m completely back to normal. How do you describe something that just turns your whole life around? That’s what it did. It’s just awesome.”
