CMH Annual Report June 1, 2013 - May 31, 2014 | Page 6

TJ John of Bolivar was diagnosed with neuro weakness
in L3, L4 and L5 of his spine and a compression fracture
in L1 and L2. Board Certified Orthopaedic Surgeon
Troy Morrison, D.O., with CMH Parkview Orthopaedic
Clinic, performed spinal fusion surgery on TJ. Two years
later in July 2014, TJ raced the Bob Cook Memorial Mt.
Evans Hill Climb in Idaho Springs, Colo. He plans to
enter the race again in 2015 with a goal of beating his
previous race time.

N

o athlete wants to be standing on
the sidelines, but for TJ John, 44,
it’s one of the views he cherishes
the most.
Two years ago TJ, an athletic trainer and
assistant athletics director for sports medicine at Southwest Baptist University (SBU)
in Bolivar, couldn’t stand for more than 10
minutes without experiencing massive back
spasms.
“My pain reached a point that I couldn’t
stand and lecture during my classes. I’d
have to sit on a stool and teach,” he recalls.
“Eventually, I couldn’t tolerate the physical component it takes to work with our
student athletes at games - I was in such
nauseating pain. Life was getting to a point
that I was basically disabled because of my
back.”
In 2005 while skiing in Canada, TJ went
to ski out of bounds. “I wasn’t wearing a
helmet, went over a cliff and lost control.
Because of my athletic training background, when I finally stood up I knew that
I was experiencing neurological damage of
some sort. My back didn’t hurt, but I had
drop foot on my right side.”
On his return back to Bolivar, TJ was
diagnosed by Lou Harris, M.D., board
certified family medicine physician with
Bolivar Family Care Center at CMH, with
neuro weakness in L3, L4 and L5 of his
spine.
For the next seven years, TJ sought relief
through daily doses of strong pain medication and treatment from neurologists
and surgeons across the state. “The pain
consumed my life,” he says. “Riding my
bike seemed to alleviate some of the pain.

So, during that time period I started to
ride, began racing and dropped about 60
pounds.”
In 2012, Board Certified Orthopaedic
Surgeon Troy Morrison, D.O., joined
CMH Parkview Orthopaedic Clinic.
Morrison specializes in back procedures
and is also a team physician at SBU. “Dr.
Morrison did his fellowship at Texas Back
Institute in Plano and I was familiar with
their latest techniques and procedures,”
TJ remembers. “As our team physician, I
would watch him work with our students
and see their outcomes. When you
suffer from severe back damage, you do
everything you can to avoid surgery. But,
I knew I was ready and had exhausted all
other resources. I wanted to go to theme
parks and the mall with my family and I

“The pain
consumed my life”

knew I had done everything I could up to
that point. And here I was, in little Bolivar,
Mo., at Citizens Memorial Hospital, in the
hands of one of the best fellowship trained
spine surgeons in the country. Dr. Morrison
listens, shows compassion, is caring and has
a quiet confidence. I knew it was the right
time, right physician and right hospital.”
An MRI showed Dr. Morrison and TJ
that a compression fracture in L1 and L2
was their focal point in moving forward
with spinal fusion surgery. TJ recalls, “For
the first time, I feel like I received a good
explanation as to what was happening in
my back. Dr. Morrison never over promised and he shot straight with me. We had

a goal of feeling 80 percent better after
my surgery, and that’s exactly where I’m at
today.”
Two years after surgery, TJ is standing
through lectures and back on the field
working with various SBU sports programs. “It’s been a gradual process,” he says.
“Shortly after surgery the physical therapists from
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