If you?re suffering from back pain, you?re not alone: when it comes to musculoskeletal impairment (back pain), over 25 percent of Americans are in the same shape. In fact, those in the U.S. who are employed miss almost 440 million days of work due to musculoskeletal injuries. This costs nearly $850 billion a year, and that?s not considering the cost of medical care!
MRI studies of asymptomatic patients, meaning those who don?t show obvious symptoms, showed around 40 percent of the population has bulging or herniated discs. While many patients respond to non-invasive treatment such as physical therapy and rest, a small percentage will require surgery to find relief from the pain and lack of mobility. If your doctor has suggested you be referred to a surgeon for cervical treatment, consider looking for expert cervical disc surgeons or a cervical disc neurosurgeon with experience using the new artificial cervical disc from Prestige. An artificial cervical disc is a device designed to be inserted between two vertebrae in the neck to take the place of a damaged disc, which will preserve motion at the disc space. It is a less invasive back surgery compared to traditional bone graft surgery.
Here are five advantages you might realize from choosing the artificial cervical disc over traditional cervical spinal surgery:
- Maintaining Normal Neck Motion:
Patients that were part of a study done on artificial cervical discs reported their range of normal neck motion did not lessen after the surgery. - Reducing Degeneration of Adjacent Segments of the Cervical Spine
With traditional surgeries such as bone grafts patients sometimes find the discs next to the injured one begin to degenerate and cause more problems. This is not the case when artificial discs are used. - Eliminating Potential Complications and Issues of Bone Grafts and Hardware
The most common complications for bone graft surgery is that either the bone graft fails to heal or there is an issue with the hardware used. The study of artificial cervical discs showed patients didn?t have these problems. - Early Postoperative Neck Motion
Because it is a less invasive back surgery, those receiving artificial cervical discs regained neck motion sooner than patients who received bone graft cervical surgery. - Earlier Return to Work
It was found that the group of patients who received the Prestige artificial cervical disc returned to work over 26 percent faster than those who had traditional cervical surgery.
While there are no long term studies yet, less invasive back surgery using artificial cervical discs appear to be the key for many herniated disc sufferers to be able to return to their usual way of life much faster than those undergoing traditional cervical surgery. Ask your doctor if you are a viable candidate for this innovative procedure, and you?ll be taking the first step to a renewed life.