Surgeon’s skills prepare Alex for Arctic adventure

When Alex Parker fell from the roof of a house, fracturing his back and badly injuring two discs in his neck, it would have been reasonable to assume that, at the very least, his days of sporting adventures were over.

But the lifelong sports fan is now back to full fitness and preparing to walk to the North Pole to raise £250,000 for charity. This follows a successful climb to the summit of Kilimanjaro last year as well as a London to Paris cycle ride!

And, as he completed another gruelling training session in preparation for his icy adventure, Alex,talked of Birmingham-based neurosurgeon Andre Jackowski, whose skill and expertise he says “made everything possible”.

Alex, managing director of Leicester Company AMP Electrical Distributors, lost his memory in the accident and can remember little about the fall, which happened two years ago. When he came out of hospital after treatment for his neck injury and fractured back he was forced to take painkillers on an almost constant basis.

Then, while on a recuperation holiday cruise to Miami, Alex, who was coverd by Private Medical Insurance, found himself in excruciating pain and unable to move his arms as fragments of the discs that had been injured during the fall pressed on his spinal cord.

He spent the entire cruise under sedation and, on his return home, began his search for an operation that could end his agony and give him back the full use of his arms.

That is when he met Consultant Neurosurgeon Andre Jackowski at BMI Priory Hospital in Birmingham. Recently named in The Times Top Fifty British surgeons list, Mr Jackowski is one of the few people in Britain to carry out the procedure of anterolateral foraminotomy - a microsurgical procedure where the surgeon enters through the front of the neck to reach the damaged area at the back.

This meant he could remove the trapped fragments while preserving the remaining discs thereby avoiding a painful bone graft or the need for artificial disc implants.

“It was amazing,” explain Alex, who lives with wife Alison in Rothley, near Leicester. “I had been told by other consultants that I faced a major operation to fuse my discs. At the very best it would have taken me many months to recover and would certainly have restricted my life style.

“Mr Jackowski just went in at the side of my throat and removed the fragments that were causing the problem in my neck. I was up and about in next to no time, the pain had gone completely and both my arms were in full working order.

“I’ve always been a keen sportsman so I was keen to get back to full fitness after my enforced lay-off,” he said. “My first big test was the London to Paris cycle ride and then, last year, I followed that up by climbing Kilimanjaro.

“Now my biggest task awaits – the North Pole trek will be a tough one but, thanks largely to Mr Jackowski, I am confident we will get there and raise £250,000 for children’s medical research charity Sparks.”

Mr Jackowski explained: “When I first met Alex he had been told that he needed an operation to completely remove two of the discs in his neck followed by bone grafting and a metal plate.

“Instead I performed a two level anterior foraminotomy that removed the painful pressure on the two nerves to his arm and yet still allowed him to keep the two discs. This was highly important for such a keen and active sportsman.”

Alex will join a team of five, all funding the trip themselves, plus two guides and a team doctor as they ski and haul sledges for 90 miles, facing temperatures as low as minus 35 degrees, blinding whiteouts and storms, and even polar bears, over their eight-day trek.

“It is a charity I have supported for a long time but this is the most ambitious total we have ever set. We have some great fund-raising events set up and have already been promised quite a lot in sponsorship so we are confident we will hit our target,” Alex said.

Anyone wishing to sponsor the team or learn more about the expedition should visit 6ordinarymen.co.uk.