I'm cutting ahead for a second before presenting my To Hell and Back story. Funny how these coincidences occur. I found out recently that a pianist friend has the same C6-C7 herniated disc issue as me and is considering surgery a few months down the road. My original perspective on this was somewhat driven by patient complaint posts from medical forums and a Dr. Ron Daulton, Jr., a chiropractor ( I will be reflecting on his Internet offering on a future blog). Plus the whole idea of them cutting open my neck and yanking stuff out and putting metal and grafts (yuck!) Anyway the friend has actually been in touch with many respected surgeons and upon re-examination it seems like success rates are much higher than I thought (although one site quoted the cryptic 48-98% success?? what the hell is that?) I have been doing some Internet research and honestly I can't find anything to corroborate Daulton's low 16% claim on his website www.healyourbulgingdisc.com. Perhaps he should just be asked :)It should be noted that a comment poster on my blog posted his success story with the procedure.
Two videos I have encountered today show the options. The first one, although essentially a cervical disc fusion and graft success story, is a bit eerie, due somewhat to the demeanor and the graphic explanations of the presenter (she posted this 10 days after surgery).
ACDF Anterior Cervical Decompression Fusion Internal Fixation Harvest Bone Graft **See also animiated ACDF below
The second appears to be a TV news story and features a St. Vincent's Hospital neurosurgeon and happy post-op patient after cervical disc replacement surgery. The video is from 2008.
New Cervical Disc Replacement
Although as far as I can tell (at least so far) the traditional fusion and the new replacement surgery claim similar success rates, the idea of retaining the mobility afforded by the replacment seems more appealing. As the fusion patient shows she has some mobility issues.
Cheers
Jon
** Note. The disc replacement surgery shown is(to my knowledge) still in the clinical trial stage. The hospital shown is St. Vincent's in Jacksonville, FL not St. Vincent's in New York City. This video is a replay of news spot on Jacksonville news. They ran a follow up story on it later on.
***Follow-up. For those of you still unclear on the ACDF surgery mentioned by the gal, I think this quick video expalins it best: ACDF Surgery Video. The technical name for the surgical procedure is Anterior Surgical Disectomy and Fusion. Essentially the disc is removed, the space filled in with bone graft (from your hip)and the graft is screwed in. Over 3 months the graft is supposed to fuse with the vertebrae adjacent to it.
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