Living with pain

At the age of 15, Erez Levanon (37) began to suffer from pain in his left hand. When it did not subside, he went to the doctor. Thus began the long process of misdiagnoses, unsuccessful surgeries, treatments, and medication that did not help and actually made things worse.

Slowly the pain began to spread to the entire left side of Erez’s body, making it difficult for him to enjoy life. He was in pain 100% of the time. The doctors believed that Erez was suffering from chronic tendon inflammation, but every attempt to treat it was unsuccessful. He became a regular patient at different pain clinics.

After years of constant pain and suffering, Erez was finally diagnosed with Thoracic Outlet Syndrome. This painful syndrome is caused by the compression of nerves between the collar bone and the first rib. The syndrome is difficult to diagnose because it shares symptoms with many other illnesses.

Erez came to Reuth for the first time in 2013. At the time, he was doing his military service.

Erez recalls, “I came to Reuth after receiving rehabilitation treatment in several other hospitals. I immediately felt that this place was different. All the information is made available to you. The staff speaks to you as an equal. You can see that all the therapists collaborate and share information with each other. It’s amazing!”

However, Erez was transferred out of Reuth. As a soldier, he had to receive medical treatment within the military framework. He spent a total of 18 years in the army, completing his service just 6 months ago.

In 2019, Erez had a daughter. To his dismay, he had great difficulty holding her. This was unacceptable to Erez and he vowed to find a solution to his chronic pain.

He advocated for himself and convinced the army’s medical corps to allow him to return to Reuth. That year, Erez began intensive treatment at our hospital.   

He says, “Reuth’s strength lies in its multidisciplinary approach. The patient receives so many different types of treatments under one roof. In addition to conventional treatments such as physiotherapy and occupational therapy, there are others including therapeutic gardening, rehabilitative yoga, art therapy, and biofeedback. It really makes all the difference.”

After so many years of pain, Erez came to Reuth with a walking stick and a lot of pessimism. To his joy and surprise, his pain became more bearable. Erez became stronger, both physically and mentally. He found rehabilitative yoga especially helpful. It taught him to manage his pain more effectively and improved his quality of life significantly. To this day, Erez continues coming to Reuth once a week.

Erez’s experience with chronic pain led to him to establish a start-up company. The company is developing an app that uses AI technology to monitor physiological indicators in order to produce an objective index for measuring and managing pain.

Erez explains, “In the world of chronic pain, subjectivity is one of the biggest issues. The ability to quantify a patient’s pain will enable the patient to work with his/her therapist and ultimately increase the effectiveness of treatment that he or she receives.”