Professor (Emeritus) John H. Munro passed away December 23, 2013

My Home Page: freely accessible to everybody.

Updated on: Thursday, 24 March 2011:

MY CURRENT MEDICAL CONDITION:: which poses no threat to my ability to meet my University of Toronto classes and to deliver my weekly lectures.

• For the past several months -- since mid October, I have been suffering from severe lower back pains, extending to the sciatic nerve in my right buttock (gluteus maximus muscle), and down the right leg. At times, especially since Christmas, neither pain killers nor physiotherapy has worked, so that the only relief from unremitting and often excruciating pain has been to lie prone, on my back, on the floor -- sometimes up to an hour at time, before the pain disappears. Evidently my current situation is related to somewhat different lower back problems from which I had suffered ten years ago (but which were then quickly cured by physiotherapy).

• My condition is, essentially, one of spinal stenosis, in my case, recently confirmed by the results of an MRI examination: i.e., a narrowing of the spinal canal in my lumbar or lower back region. That is aggravated seriously by three arthritic, deformed, and fused vertebrae (L4, L5 and L6 -- L for lumbar), which are evidently pinching the nerves that lead to the sciatic nerve , in the region of the gluteus maximus (gluteal muscles); and these nerves thus extend into the leg, via the 'hamstring' -- my right leg, down past the knee cap.

• Though physiotherapy, begun in early January, has evidently not worked, message therapy, commencing on 7 February, has proved to be more promising -- perhaps because I have continued with a twice-daily regime of the physio exercises, and also because I have also lost considerable weight -- now, about 30 lb or 13.64 kg (from the pain, the pain-killers, and now delberate dieting).

• Until recently, this condition has cut my productivity by more than one half: (1) because the pain itself has made it very difficult to work properly, forcing me to lie prone on the floor to get relief from the pain, (2) because the pain-killers (with codeine) induce sleepiness (though I needed the rest), and (3) because I have had to spend a considerable amount of time each week on medical treatments and physio- and then (and now) message thereapy.

• This serious loss of my working ability combined with pessimism (depression) about any recovery has also made me periodically depressed, further reducing my working capacity.

• Now there is some considerable hope of recovery, allowing me to work more productively, for longer periods of time (and now without having to lie on the floor for extended periods), and improving my spirits. This now ongoing and continuing recovery seems to result from the combination of the message therapy, the excercises recommended by the physiotherapist, and the weight loss.

• As indicated above, I refuse to allow this medical problem to interfere with my teaching, but it certainly has interfered with and much delayed my other academic projects, to which, fortunately, I am now returning, and with some vigour. I hope that those concerned will understand my current predicament (which, I understand, is not necessarily related to aging, and affects many people much younger than me).

• As of late March, I am still experiencing almost constant pain in the gluteus maximus (or sciatic neve region) and am still dependent on pain killers, if not as much as before. But my working capacity has been restored almost to normal.
  
  
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