ROCK HILL, S.C. — After 30 years of surgeries, medications, and chronic pain, Sue Mundy is finally walking pain-free, and she credits a new robotic spine procedure at Piedmont Medical Center for giving her life back.
Mundy gets her steps in along the Riverwalk in Rock Hill, which is something she couldn’t do for years because of chronic back pain.
“It hurt to walk, to sit stand, when I was working, I had to do sitting and standing,” she said.
Mundy was an avid runner but it caught up to her with back issues, including slipped discs.
“In the beginning, it was shooting pains and then it got intolerable,” she said. “It started interfering with my way of life. I woke up one morning and I couldn’t get out of bed. It was hard to move and ended up in the ER.”
She had 10 surgeries and was constantly on pain medication for 30 years with no permanent relief.
“Once they repaired the disc, it would get a little better but of course, it would come back,” Mundy said.
She turned to Dr. Joseph Cheatle, a neurosurgeon with Piedmont Medical Center.
“We get an MRI. It shows she has severe stenosis and Spondylosis, which means the bones literally are slipped off each other,” Cheatle said.
Cheatle recommended a surgery using a robot called the Globus with Excelsius 3D Imaging.
It helps to locate problems with pinpoint accuracy.
PMC was one of the first hospital systems in the Carolinas to use it.
“The unique thing about robotic surgery is it allows us to make smaller incisions,” the doctor said.
Mundy said she felt the difference less than a week after surgery.
“Before I went in for my follow up appointment, I had ditched the walker and didn’t use the gripper,” Mundy said.
She felt like herself again months later.
“And now pain free. No meds. No nothing,” she said.
She plans to return to something she loves soon.
“Give me a couple months and I will be running,” Mundy said.
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