Fred R. Shilling

January 9, 2019 I underwent cervical spine surgery with Dr. Todd Albert, Surgeon-in-Chief Emeritus. At the time he was a recommendation from one of my clients Dr. Rock Positano. Dr. P said, "there is no better doctor at this than Dr. Albert. After receiving a second opinion, Dr. Albert's diagnosis was 100% correct. The decision of who to use was very simple. Dr. Albert has some of the highest credentials and recommendations and success stories I have ever seen. The correct answer was and to this day the right one. I have 99% full movement in my neck, and one of the symptoms of my diagnosis was that my spinal cord was was compromised a lot. My arms did not move more then a few inches in any direction you could think of, I also had two disks replaced and C5-C7 fusion. This was not something that could be waited on. Results - nothing but amazing to this day. I was told the recovery would be 4-6 weeks minimum, I was back to work against doctor's recommendation at 3 1/2 weeks. I was elated.

Now 17 months later I woke up with sciatica nerve pain down my right lateral leg from my upper thigh to my ankle with numbness in my shin area. At times I could not walk two steps without doubling over. I contacted a local doctor that gave me an injection at the L4-L5 site to try and relieve the inflammation. A week later I had 25% relief. Then the pain returned to 100%.

Once again I called Dr. Albert's office to make an appointment. I had x-rays and an MRI that concluded that I had degenerative disks of my lumber spine. I was devastated that he recommended surgery again, but I put my trust back in Dr Albert to put me back together a second time. I was admitted on a Tuesday and released on Friday. More painful than the cervical spine surgery, I now am home recovering. It's only been a week so far but I left the hospital with no nerve pain at all. The recovery for this surgery as opposed to the cervical spine surgery seems to be a little harder due to the nature of the surgery and location, etc.

Six days after the surgery, I now feel as if everything is going to be alright again. There are no side effects that I have experienced to date, just healing. I wanted to also thank Dr. Albert's unbelievable staff who worked tirelessly under the Covid-19 days that we all experienced to make sure that my care was no less then at any other time. His office manager, Betsy, helped me every day prior to the surgery taking extra precautions knowing I'm sort of a difficult patient. Nothing short of amazing. Julie and Natisha, Dr. Albert's PAs, were right there even on the weekends when I needed questions answered. There was also a fellow, Dr. James, who visited me everyday in the hospital to re-assure me I was going to be alright. He too was nothing short of amazing.

In conclusion, if you're thinking of having or require spine surgery, by far Dr. Todd Albert is highly skilled and nothing short of being one of the top surgeons I ever heard about or experienced twice.