UH’s Scrambler Therapy brings major pain relief to post-op breast cancer patient, area mom

WILLOUGHBY, Ohio — A major medical breakthrough for cancer patients recovering from treatment is now available within one Northeast Ohio hospital system.

“Scrambler Therapy” is bringing both comfort and relief to thousands who have experienced pain and neuropathy.

North Royalton mom of four Sandi Schario says it has successfully changed her life.

She’s finally at ease.

It comes after she endured the fight of her life.

Her world was turned upside down when she was diagnosed with breast cancer back in 2021.

“They discovered cancer so it had gone to a couple of lymph nodes so I had a partial mastectomy and 31 treatments of radiation,” Schario said.

The treatments were thankfully successful, but the post-op-pain was constant, irritating, and down right uncomfortable in her arm.

“I don’t know if it was from surgery or from radiation, I was having squeezing in my left arm and numbness and tingling down my left arm,” Schario said.

She tried everything imaginable to get rid of it.

“I had gone through OT, two rounds of PT, acupuncture, medical massage, injections,” Schario said.

She ultimately ended up at the office of University Hospitals interventional pain specialist Dr. Henry Vucetic.

It was where he would introduce her to a lilife-alertingevice in the form of Scrambler Therapy, in the Scrambler Room.

“We replace an unhealthy signal to the brain with a healthy signal to the brain,” Vucetic said.

Vucetic works hand-in-hand with nurse practitioner Katie O’Boyle, as they place electrodes around where the pain is coming from in Schario’s arm.

“Once we get to a certain spot, Sandi will say I feel tingling,” Vucetic said.

The device stimulates nerves and essentially scrambles how your brain interprets the pain.

“If we can stimulate along the damaged pathway and the brain can experience a healing signal then we can reverse some of the negative side effects,” Vucetic said.

Doctors at UH say the best part about this device is that it’s proven successful multiple times over, and the entire process is fast and takes just one hour per session.

Schario says it was so painless, that she was able to help plan her daughter’s wedding during each of the 12, one-hour-long sessions.

“There was absolutely no pain, no discomfort. I was able to drive home,” Schario said.

Vucetic says scrambler therapy is low-risk, non-invasive, and helps with basically any type of nerve-related pain.

He says seeing the device bring such relief is why he got into medicine.

“We’ve acquired a machine that’s gonna make a difference in people’s lives and it’s a sense of pride we’re growing something here,” Vucetic said.

“I did not want to take meds at all so this was a great alternative for that. It worked for me. I hope they get more of them,” Schario said.

Schario has successfully completed a dozen scrambler therapy sessions and she says she would do it again in a heartbeat.

At this time, ONLY cancer patients are eligible for scrambler therapy.

Patients who qualify will come for eight consecutive visits over two weeks.

UH is now getting a second scrambler device to keep up with demand.

If you want to check to see if you qualify for the procedure or contact the physicians behind it you can contact
UH’s main scheduling phone number at: 1-888-810-2216.

For more on Dr. Vucetic, click here.