Making Rounds
A doctor becomes the patient and is quickly back on his feet
Wes Jones, MD, remembers the day in 1983 when he decided where his medical career would unfold. As he was finishing a gastroenterology fellowship at Duke, and considering a number of places where he might begin his practice, a colleague told him he might want to check out Fayetteville. He added it to his list of cities to explore and set out for a drive with his wife, Lucy.
“We saw a sign for Fayetteville to the right, but I missed the exit,” he said. “And then a short while later I saw another sign for Fayetteville, and this one pointed to the left.”
With all signs literally pointing to Fayetteville, they had a look around and soon felt right at home.
“And we just knew that’s where God wanted us to be,” he said. “So I’ve been here since ‘83.”
After nearly four decades of practice at Cape Fear Valley, Dr. Jones retired in 2020. And late last year, despite a very active lifestyle, the doctor became a patient.
“It began with some numbness on the top of my foot,” he said. “I thought my shoe wasn’t on correctly, so I adjusted that and did fine the rest of the day.”
But the next day, the numbness was back. Over the next few days, it spread to his ankle and up to his mid-calf. This was not a good sign.
“The MRI showed lumbar stenosis with severe compression in the lower spinal canal,” Jones said. “Given my symptom progression, I was concerned about becoming paraplegic.”
Soon Jones was evaluated by Charles Haworth, MD, at Cape Fear Valley Neurosurgery. The two were already well acquainted.
“He’s a good guy,” Dr. Haworth said. “He’s a go-getter and just a real optimist. He’s not a complainer. I was alarmed that he was in this condition and still trying to carry on.”
Three days later, Dr. Jones was in surgery. Dr. Haworth spent hours carefully clearing the overgrowth that had compressed the nerves, fusing the affected vertebrae to return sensation and function to Dr. Jones’ legs.
“That was the Monday before Thanksgiving,” Dr. Jones said. “And I was out of the hospital on Wednesday, which is pretty remarkable for a five-hour procedure. The next day I was outside with a walker. I used that for a week, and a month later I was walking four or five miles.”
This was his usual routine before the surgery, and he was glad to be back at it. But as the weeks went by, Dr. Haworth worried he might be overdoing it.
“We always tell patients we want them to do some walking,” Dr. Haworth said. “And I knew he was doing a mile or two at the beginning, but then another friend told me he was doing three miles a day, and then he’s up to five or six or seven. And it’s like, how many people his age do anything near that?”
Dr. Jones felt fine but agreed to scale back to three or four miles a day, at least until they could confirm at a three-month follow-up that all was well.
“And the X-rays were completely unchanged from the ones right after surgery,” he said. “Dr. Haworth was very pleased with that, so I could keep walking as far as I liked.”
As his remarkable recovery continued, Dr. Jones was surprised by how many people assumed he’d gone out of town for his surgery.
“People have this mindset that you have to go to Duke or UNC for the best,” he said. “But as a doctor and now a patient, I can tell you I don’t think I would have gotten better care there than what I got at Cape Fear Valley. There’s just not a lot of reason to go so far away.”
“Once you have a neurological symptom like numbness, and it’s spreading, that is a big red flag, and you need to get it checked out.”
Dr. Haworth agreed, and said Dr. Jones has been a large part of Cape Fear Valley’s evolution into a robust, thriving health system.
“He’s given so much back to the hospital and now to the medical school,” Dr. Haworth said. “He’s just a very special, unique person in the community.”
Dr. Jones said he wants people to know that symptoms like his are not to be ignored. He had powered through many years of back trouble, keeping the discomfort at bay with plenty of walking, swimming and yoga.
“It’s one thing to have back discomfort that comes and goes,” he said. “But once you have a neurological symptom like numbness, and it’s spreading, that is a big red flag, and you need to get it checked out.”
Learn more at capefearvalley.com/neuro.
