Keri Beats Unbearable Back Pain with Complex Spine Surgery at UF Health Jacksonville

Keri Atchley went from being a daredevil horseback rider to barely being able to get out of bed. From a yoga instructor to struggling to bend and load the dishwasher. From a weightlifter to laboring just to lift her little dog onto her lap. From a meditation coach to someone who could only manage to focus on her own pain.

For nearly 20 years, chronic back issues slowly transformed Keri, physically and emotionally, into an unrecognizable version of herself.

“I was in constant pain, even while sleeping. It was bad,” Keri said. “It was definitely taking a major toll on my emotions.”

Keri, now 51, says the back pain started while she was pregnant with her second child 19 years ago. She believes it was a byproduct of a horseback-riding accident several years prior in which she broke her tailbone and couldn’t sit without discomfort for the next two years.

While that certainly wasn’t the only physical injury that Keri — once an equestrian, gymnast and personal trainer — would experience, it’s the one that wouldn’t go away. It progressed to the point that it was unbearable, with Keri calling it “a cycle of misery.”

Other health issues would contribute to a lower quality of life, but the back pain separated Keri from the thrill-seeker she once was and sent the upbeat Destin, Florida, native into a downward spiral.

Back Against the Wall

As she sought care at other health systems, doctors struggled to capture the full extent of Keri’s condition. MRIs and CT scans revealed disc fluid leakage, but nothing else was abnormal.

Even considering surgery as a treatment option was a mental hurdle Keri had to clear first. Years ago, she had a taxing experience while taking care of her father after a back surgery, one that came with a long recovery process. She dreaded having a back procedure herself and feared the results, so she tried everything to avoid one, including massage, acupuncture and yoga.

But desperate for relief, Keri — living in Destin at the time — began spending countless hours educating herself on back anatomy and surgeries.

“I watched every kind of YouTube video you could imagine with all sorts of different practitioners, sports rehabilitation therapists, you name it,” Keri said. “And all these other very good forces out there for people fighting for their physical health. So I probably watched hundreds of hours.”

She’d eventually undergo three surgeries to try to eliminate her lower back pain. About 15 years ago, Keri underwent a hysterectomy, thinking that endometriosis was the cause.

“That did solve a lot of issues,” Keri said. “I had abdominal cramping, hip and groin pain. Just all over. That helped with all the pain except the back pain.”

Then, about five years ago, Keri elected to have another operation. This time, it was a sacroiliac, or SI, joint fusion surgery, designed to stabilize the sacroiliac joint by fusing the sacrum and ilium bones.

Rather than moving her past this relentless loop of discomfort, the SI joint fusion turned out to be a setback.

“I didn’t have the confidence in my doctors to ever go through more than that SI fusion surgery,” Keri said. “COVID hit right at the same time, so I didn’t get any physical therapy for about two years after that surgery.”

Keri felt hopeless on the heels of that operation. That was when Keri hit rock bottom after years of being weighed down by her condition.

“I’ve always been a happy-go-lucky kid, and it about did me in as a person dealing with it for that long,” Keri said. “Just more and more everyday activities were starting to be taken away from me.”

The key to Keri recapturing her life was about five hours east across the Florida Panhandle in Jacksonville, where her husband landed a job and where her life would change forever.

Keri’s Life-Changing Surgery

In May 2024, Keri and her family relocated to Jacksonville. There, she had the option of getting care at two separate health systems.

“The other place didn’t take my insurance,” Keri said. “But UF Health Jacksonville could get me in, like immediately, and I was shocked.”

Keri’s arduous journey, one that spanned nearly two decades, left her with an empty tank of optimism as she walked through yet another set of hospital doors.

“I just felt like I was losing everything, and to the point where before I met with the surgeons here, hopeless,” Keri said. “I mean, it had gotten to the point where before I had my SI fuse, I had the hopes of regaining my quality of life. Getting no relief from that surgery really, really made me not want to have surgery again.”

That changed when she visited a pair of brothers, UF Health Jacksonville neurosurgeons Kourosh Tavanaiepour, DO, and Daryoush Tavanaiepour, MD. After evaluation, which included comprehensive medical imaging with a CT scan and nuclear bone scan, they identified Keri as a viable candidate for a complex spine surgery called transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion, or TLIF.

The procedure involves accessing the spine through an incision in the back, removing one or more damaged discs and inserting a bone graft or cage between the vertebrae to facilitate fusion.

“I do believe that timing is everything,” Keri said. “I don’t know why I endured 20 years without feeling the confidence that they could fix it. But that was something that the doctors and the whole team instantly instilled — that this is what’s going to help and that I should get a lot of relief and be able to go back to a quality of living.”

In Keri’s case, she had degenerative disc disease in the L4 and L5 vertebrae and L5S1 lumbosacral joint. Keri needed a two-level fusion, effectively stopping motion between two affected spinal segments.

While TLIFs are common, UF Health Jacksonville offers a unique approach that enhances results.

“What is different from other typical spine surgeries that do a TLIF is we do an expandable cage,” said Dr. K. Tavanaiepour, Keri’s primary surgeon. “And what that does is hopefully increase the rate of fusion, which sometimes some patients don’t get. Also, (the expandable cage) helps in that because it’s so large, it indirectly frees all the nerves. Lastly, it helps to restore the lordosis, or the alignment of the patient, which we also did. So all to help with better chances for the patient to have a great outcome.”

Dr. K. Tavanaiepour told Keri he could almost guarantee 50% recovery, but in reality, the Tavanaiepour brothers were aiming for much better.

“I remember thinking if I get 20%, if I can just walk again without being in so much pain and be active again and run and not hurt, you know, just every time I cough or sneeze,” Keri said.

Keri’s Back

Keri came in for surgery on Nov. 14, 2024. That same day, she could get up and walk across the room on her own with no pain. And she didn’t feel a thing the next day when she went home and managed to climb the stairs to her bedroom.

“It was 80% better, I’d say, at my six-week appointment. I couldn’t believe I could move without pain,” Keri said. “You get so conditioned for so long, you don’t realize how much you modify your life. I’m shocked, in all honesty, that not only did I have a good outcome, but so quick and so drastic a positive outcome.”

The full scope of Keri’s condition wasn’t known until the surgery was performed. The Tavanaiepour brothers told Keri that the imaging wasn’t able to capture the extent of her bone spurs and arthritis, making the surgery more complex.

However, Keri was in the hands of brothers she praised as being equally compassionate and capable. The Tavanaiepours strive to work together on as many cases as possible, tag-teaming to be in a position to tackle the unpredictable nature of medical care.

“To get two neurosurgeons is a wonderful thing because now you have two sets of neurosurgeon eyes looking to help take care of them,” Dr. K. Tavanaiepour said. “We collaborate so well. We’re best of friends. We’re brothers. And because of that, we really can help ensure the patient gets the best possible outcome.”

At 10 weeks post-surgery, Keri began physical therapy at UF Health Rehabilitation – Emerson with Bob Wolfson. Because of her rapid progress in recovery, she only needed a handful of rehab sessions.

Since the surgery, Keri has felt a closer bond with her family, particularly her two daughters.

“The relationship with my girls over the past two years has gotten stronger than it ever was,” Keri said. “What we went through made us stronger as a family. I would do anything for them. They’re my number ones. My girls are everything to me.”

Her experience at UF Health Jacksonville has also helped her rediscover the active version of herself that had gradually begun to disappear about two decades ago.

“I’m so grateful. I got a new back for Christmas. I got my life back. Along with the physical recovery, it’s the mental recovery as well. I just feel sharper. I’m not constantly thinking about pain. To be able to focus and just get stuff done, it’s helped me so much on so many levels.”