If you need spine surgery, your surgeon may choose a minimally invasive approach. Here are seven key advantages to that approach.
Back pain is a widespread ailment, afflicting 8 out of 10 people at least once during their lives. Your spine, composed of 24 bony vertebrae with soft intervertebral discs between them as cushioning, extends from the base of the skull into the neck (cervical spine), through the chest (thoracic spine), and down to the lower back (lumbar spine). Back pain can occur anywhere along the chain, and it can be sudden and sharp, throbbing, or a constant dull ache.
At Endoscopic & Minimally Invasive Spine Specialists, board-certified neurosurgeons Dr. Scott Glickman and Dr. Aaron Smith specialize in minimally invasive and endoscopic spine surgery (MISS) to treat a wide range of back and spinal conditions. That’ is because MISS has a number of advantages over traditional techniques. Here is what you need to know about spinal conditions and why MISS might be the best treatment option for you. Here is a brief summary of MISS that we are happy to elaborate during your evaluation:
How is minimally invasive spine surgery different from traditional techniques?
In the past, surgeons used an open procedure, making a single, long incision in the skin. And in the case of spine surgery, the surgeon would also have to cut through muscle and connective tissue, and detach them from the bone. The result was typically significant blood loss, a great deal of pain after the procedure, a serious risk of infection, and a long recovery. Also, the risk of future surgical needs was quite high.
In the 1980’s, though, minimally invasive surgery came into its own, gradually making its way through various specialties, including neurosurgery. A minimally invasive technique requires the surgeon to make just one or two small incisions, each only about ½-1 inch long. Next, they insert a small tube with a camera on its end, called an endoscope, that allows us to watch what we are doing on a large monitor. Finally, we feed in extremely small instruments beside the camera to repair or remove tissue. Each incision usually requires a single stitch to close.
8 key advantages of MISS
The seven major advantage of this type of procedure include:
1. Most performed on an outpatient basis — go home the same day
2. Reduced trauma to surrounding muscles and soft tissue
3. Less scarring
4. Less blood loss during and after surgery
5. Reduced risk of pain and infection after surgery
6. Less need for pain medication after surgery
7. Faster recovery with less rehabilitation needed
8. Less likely to require additional spine surgery in the future due to less adjacent segment degeneration
And many of the procedures can be done with sedation and local anesthesia, or much less lengthy anesthetic, meaning there is less chance of a bad reaction to general anesthesia.
What conditions can be treated using MISS?
MISS can be used to treat the symptoms of and improve spinal function in people with conditions that include:
- Age-related degenerative disc disease
- Cervical or lumbar spinal stenosis
- Bulging or herniated discs
- Spinal deformities like scoliosis and kyphosis
- Spinal instability, including spondylolisthesis
- Vertebral compression fractures from osteoporosis
- Spinal tumors
Some of the procedures EMISS surgeons perform with MISS include:
- Discectomy: trims or removes herniated discs
- Spinal Decompression: removes bone and soft tissue causing painful nerve root compression
- Transforaminal Lumbar Interbody Fusion (TLIF): replaces damaged disc with bone-filled cage to provide more spinal stability
- Spinal Instrumentation: fuses discs to immobilize painful joints
- Rhizotomy: identifies and allows direct denervation of the pain-causing small nerves of the facet joints to eliminate pain
Through technological advances, hardware placement through penny-size incisions has become safer and extremely accurate.
If you are suffering from persistent back pain and need relief, the best thing you can do is to come to Endoscopic & Minimally Invasive Spine Specialists for an evaluation with Dr. Glickman or Dr. Smith. Call our office at 813-505-8485.
