Maria Rocio Lois Suárez. Neuro-Cranio-Vertebral Syndrome. Filum Disease. Arnold-Chiari Syndrome Type I. Multiple Disc Disease.

Published by ICSEB at 29 April, 2019

Surgery date: 22/11/2018



First of all, my deepest gratitude to the medical team headed by Dr. Marco V. Fiallos and my congratulations to Dr. Royo on the Institut’s 10th anniversary

I want my testimonial to serve as a thank you for your work and efforts for so many years and as a proof of the reliability of the Filum System technique for which you have worked so hard.

I also want it to reach both the academic and medical field, to make people think about the importance of training, so that cases like mine do not fall into administrative and social ostracism.

I would also like to shake the consciences of some medical professionals who perform their work in an impersonal way, without taking into account the suffering of patients with no means to be heard.

Until May 2018, when I contacted the ICSEB, no one had associated my health problems, disparate and increasingly intense, to a spinal cord traction, nor suspected the existence of a Chiari type I, not to mention relating my symptoms to a terrible disease – “Syringomyelia” (centro-medullary ischaemia oedema).

My childhood memories are of muscular pains, orthopaedic insoles, repeated throat infections and bronchitis. In my adolescence and youth, I coped with the studies and life of this age with a lot of physical and mental fatigue.

When I started to work, the tachycardia, chest pain, choking sensation, constant throat infections, later on ear infections, vertigo also began. I had aphonia with minimum effort, sensation of suffering a continuous flu. Antibiotics and anti-inflammatories became my usual companions.

In my thirties I started to have sporadic episodes of shoulder and arm pain. When in bed, I had pain in my legs that would not let me relax (someone thought of rheumatoid fever, although over time the rheumatic factor was found negative).

These pains intensified and became chronic, leading to a loss of strength in my hands, tingling and loss of sensitivity. I was diagnosed with bilateral carpal tunnel syndrome and after spending an almost complete course working and not sleeping, they suggested surgery. I also underwent throat surgery due to infections, since they diminished temporarily only with penicillin treatments.

In my forties, muscle aches, stiffness and the usual fatigue intensified. Stress? Maybe I had to relax and delegate responsibilities. But this does not happen to those of my age.

Neck pain and torticollis were frequent, arthralgias made their appearance. Episodes of tachycardia lead to a more in-depth study of the heart and a treatment with bisoprolol.

Later on I was told about possible fibromyalgia. I saw a rheumatologist and with a blood test he diagnosed polymyalgia and recommended treatment with corticosteroids and muscle relaxants. At the beginning, the pain subsided, but after some time it appeared again with greater intensity. Insomnia began and with it more vertigo and weak immune defenses.

Already in my fifties, in addition to the symptoms of menopause, dizziness, pain in upper and lower extremities, intercostal grid and knees persist, making it impossible walking down the stairs and kneeling down. I experienced periods of lumbosciatic.

MRIs showed lumbar, cervical and dorsal disc disease.

I received a diagnosis of cervical myotensive syndrome. I got used to the loss of tone in my voice, the swallowing difficulty when tired, the loss of balance and instability.

In 2016 I suffered a work accident in which I fell down the stairs and broke my left wrist and hit my lower back. The ordeal of a constant and throbbing pain without remission began.

In rheumatology I was diagnosed with a major lumbar nerve entrapment, although the administration considered it a degenerative process.
In traumatology, they recommended a bone density test. The osteoporosis test result was -3.

I tried a treatment with bisphosphonates, which resulted in extreme spine stiffness and inability to move that mainly affected the left limbs. They recommended a scintigraphy (I still do not know well what for). After a period of recovery, they recommended treatment for osteoarthritis and arthritis. I turned to ozone infiltrations, without results. The sequelae of neuropathic pain in my left leg and feet remain and the low back pain as well.

Between the years 2017 – 2018 began the tremors and the sensation of salty taste in my mouth, always accompanied by unbearable pain in the lower end of the spine.
Every day I had the sensation of a more and more crooked jaw (like dislocated), the neuralgias, the stabbing sensation in the eyes, the choking and the sudden loss of voice.
In neurology they interpreted this as cervical impingement and recommended physiotherapy. The response was very bad, after 4 sessions, with loss of strength in my legs.

My immune defenses got weaker; I had urine infection, followed by herpes zoster in my arms. I took an antiviral and anticonvulsant treatment. I was in pain when defecating and had extreme constipation. Hypothermia reached 32ºC.

At this point I only had two options left: ask God to take my life, or find some way to heal.

I started to search the Internet and associate symptoms. By chance I found a video on You-Tube about Chiari. It sounded familiar to me. I discovered the ICSEB web page and the information it contained made me think that in Barcelona they could help me. I requested an appointment in May 2018.

The medical team informed me that, in addition to multiple disc disease, the MRI showed a descent of the cerebellar tonsils and the Filum disease, generated by a spinal cord traction caused by an excessively tense Filum terminale.

When I found out about this I felt a mixture of pain and anger. How did I get here?

I tried and found the means and booked the intervention for last November.
Everything went as the medical team had described to me, although my expectations at first were far below my actual evolution.

Being able to leave the hospital walking and facing a trip of 1000 km gave me a lot of security. On the trip I noticed a visual clarity I was not used to.
It has been 3 months in which I have still had pain (mostly lumbar) but different from the stabbing feeling I used to have. That dagger, metaphorically speaking, that was stuck between my buttocks disappeared. The pain in my feet diminished and only reappeared in moments of fatigue.

Rigidity and lack of flexibility are disappearing. The intestinal function is regularized. The only negative aspect is a feeling of nervousness (which can be due to personal and work reasons) and the lack of stability in my vision (which I perceive as changing at different times of the day). I hope that, as a result of an enhancement of cerebral circulation, they will both eventually disappear.