Surgery to Remove a Nerve Tumor Restores Rose’s Joy
Eleven years of constant pain had left Rose Boehmer worn down and discouraged. Then she met Robert Spinner, M.D., a neurosurgeon at Mayo Clinic, who not only identified the long-hidden source of her pain, he and his surgical team eliminated it — returning Rose to a full and happy life.
Rose
Boehmer had endured chronic pain for so long, she’d forgotten what it was like
to live without it.
“I have a condition called schwannomatosis,” Rose says. “It’s a rare form of neurofibromatosis that causes benign tumors to grow on my spinal and peripheral nerves.” Eleven years ago, one tumor in particular began to have a significant effect on Rose’s daily life. Although it went undiagnosed until recently, the tumor was on her sciatic nerve, and the agony it caused was extreme. “I was in constant pain,” Rose says. “I couldn’t do anything to get comfortable.”
Lying
down or sitting up — the pain persisted no matter her body position. “The
pain was actually worse when I lay down,” Rose says. “I was only
getting a few hours of sleep at a time, and as such, I was constantly irritable,
frustrated and angry.”
The
pain wreaked havoc on Rose’s mental and physical health. “Eventually, the
pain diminished my quality of life to the point where I didn’t feel like I had
anything to look forward to,” she says. “Before the tumor, gardening,
baking and photography had been some of my favorite hobbies. But the tumor had
made them too painful to enjoy. I couldn’t even sit and read a book because the
pain was too distracting. It had taken all of the joy out of my life.”
A long-sought answer
Rose
also was disheartened because the doctors and surgeons who she consulted near
her home in Mason City, Iowa, couldn’t offer any solutions. “At first, I
was given a different diagnosis by each doctor,” Rose says. “No one
could pinpoint a reason for my pain. Every appointment ended in disappointment.”
When Rose was referred to the Department of Neurosurgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester earlier this year, her expectations were low. “I scheduled an appointment for May 14, but I was not hopeful,” she says. “I didn’t want to be disappointed again.”
“(Dr. Spinner’s) knowledge, expertise and experience immediately put my mind at ease.”
Rose Boehmer
Just
a few minutes into her appointment with Robert
Spinner, M.D., chair of the Department of
Neurosurgery, however, Rose allowed herself to feel hopeful. “Shortly
after Dr. Spinner and his surgical team entered the room, my entire mood
changed,” Rose says. “His knowledge, expertise and experience immediately
put my mind at ease.”
But
it was what Dr. Spinner and his team did next, Rose says, that was most
meaningful. “After running some tests, they saw the tumor on my sciatic
nerve,” she says. “He then asked me if I’d like to have it removed
the following day. I couldn’t believe that 11 years of suffering was finally
going to end. My husband even started to tear up.”
Before coming to Mayo Clinic, Rose had been receiving care for two tumors on her spine. “Unfortunately no treatment helped my pain because those tumors were not causing it,” she says. “No one had looked beyond my spine until a local pain management doctor decided to run a broader MRI. That’s when they finally saw the tumor on my sciatic nerve. My local neurosurgeon, however, couldn’t tell where the tumor was in association to the nerve, so no one was comfortable removing it.”
Dr.
Spinner was comfortable doing that surgery, and he explained to Rose how he and
his team could accomplish it. “I had complete confidence in him,”
Rose says.
Filled
with that confidence, Rose agreed to move forward. “Dr. Spinner actually
had to split the fibers of my sciatic nerve in order to get to the tumor and
remove it,” Rose says. “Before coming to Mayo, I was told it was a
procedure no surgeon could do. Dr. Spinner, however, knew exactly how to remove
the tumor. He and his team did what I had been told could not be done.”
After
surgery, the pain that had haunted Rose for more than a decade vanished. “It
was as if someone had flipped a switch. The nerve pain was completely gone”
Rose says. “I felt liberated and was finally comfortable again.”
A life without limits
The
relief Rose felt after surgery produced a dramatic shift in her world. “When
you’re in pain every minute of every day, that becomes the No. 1 worry at the
top of your list,” she says. “When that constant worry is suddenly
gone, your whole life completely changes.”
That
change has affected all of Rose’s activities — from getting ready in the
morning to enjoying time with her family. “I can stand in front of a
mirror and put makeup on, which is something I hadn’t done in years. I can go
to concerts and other events again, and get on the floor and play with my
grandchildren. Not to mention just how much different and easier it is to sleep
at night,” she says. “I feel like I can do anything I want to do now.
I don’t have any limitations.”
“Now I feel like I want to live to be 100 years old because it’s just been such a wonderful change.”
Rose Boehmer
Along
with the improvement in her physical health, the surgery has also had a
positive effect on Rose’s mental health. “Before surgery, I was reaching a
point where I thought I was going to have to live in pain for the rest of my
life. And quite honestly, I didn’t want to live a whole lot longer,” she
says. “Now I feel like I want to live to be 100 years old because it’s
just been such a wonderful change.”
For
that, Rose says, “there aren’t enough words” to thank Dr. Spinner and
the rest of her care team. “Everybody at Mayo Clinic is so professional
and so knowledgeable,” she says. “That alone made me feel so
comfortable. It’s such a benefit to have a whole team of people looking at you,
caring for you, diagnosing you. That made me feel much more confident of the
diagnosis I received. Dr. Spinner and his team at Mayo Clinic gave me my life
back.”
From
Dr. Spinner’s perspective, finding the source of Rose’s pain was just as
rewarding as removing it. “The biggest thing was finding the tumor at the
site of where her pain was, and then taking it out so that her pain would be
gone,” he says. “She had other tumors that weren’t causing her pain,
but we found the one on her sciatic nerve. Others had found her pain in the
wrong spot; we found it in the right spot.”
Being
able to achieve that accurate diagnosis for her, coupled with Rose’s improved
lifestyle and emotional well-being, is all the thanks Dr. Spinner says he
needs. “It’s just awesome to know that my team and I have the potential to
do this for other people,” he says. “It’s why we do what we do.”
HELPFUL LINKS
- Read more about neurofibromatosis.
- Learn about the Department of Neurosurgery.
- Connect with others talking about spine health on Mayo Clinic Connect.
- Explore Mayo Clinic.
- Request an appointment.