Spine Surgery Specialist

Surgery isn’t a treatment to take lightly, but you might want to consider it when nothing else reduces your chronic pain. If you’re wondering how spine surgery can help, talk to the surgical team at Alliance Spine Associates, LLC in Fair Lawn, New Jersey. They have extensive experience doing spine surgeries, including discectomy, spinal decompression, and fusion. Call their office today or book an appointment online to learn more about your spine surgery options.

Why would I need spine surgery?

If you have a back or neck disorder, you might benefit from spine surgery when other treatments aren’t working.

Alliance Spine Associates, LLC offers many effective treatments for spine conditions, ranging from medication and physical therapy to epidural steroid injections and radiofrequency ablation. Most of their patients respond well to these treatments and never need surgery.

For some people, even the most advanced interventions aren’t successful. If you’re one of them, Alliance Spine Associates, LLC’s experienced surgeons will meet with you to discuss spine surgery.

What spine surgery might I require?

The surgery you need will depend on what’s wrong with your spine. Common spine surgeries include:

Decompression

Nerve compression often causes back pain, frequently due to spinal stenosis (narrowing of the spinal canal). Spinal decompression surgery reduces or relieves the pressure on these nerves. It involves taking out pieces of bone, thickened or damaged tissue, or whole sections of the vertebra to widen your spinal canal and make room for the nerves.

Disc surgery

Spinal discs form a protective cushion between your vertebrae. They have a soft, shock-absorbent core and a tough outer shell. Trauma or conditions like degenerative disc disease can weaken the outer layer, allowing the core to push through and into the spinal canal.

Your Alliance Spine Associates, LLC surgeon can perform a microdiscectomy, just taking out the damaged piece of the disc. If the entire disc needs removing, they do a discectomy. Afterward, you might need artificial disc replacement surgery to implant a new disc. Alternatively, you can undergo spinal fusion.

Fusion surgery

Fusion permanently joins two or more vertebrae. After a discectomy or spinal decompression surgery, you might need spinal fusion to stabilize your spine. Your surgeon uses a piece of bone (graft) to link the vertebrae and encourage new bone growth.

What techniques are used in spine surgery?

The traditional spine surgery technique is to make a large cut into your body through the muscles. The surgeon views the surgery site directly while doing the operation. The problem with this open technique is that it causes significant tissue damage. That means considerable pain after surgery and a lengthy recovery.

An alternative is minimally invasive spine surgery (MISS). Instead of making a large incision, your surgeon uses retractors (tubular instruments) to access the spine through much smaller cuts. The muscles stay largely intact because the retractors push them aside rather than cutting through them.

Your surgeon completes the procedure using a surgical microscope or tiny camera (endoscope) to view your spine.

The Alliance Spine Associates, LLC team uses the least invasive approaches when doing spine surgery. Call their office or book an appointment online today to learn more.