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Very OT: Has anyone here had a lower back op?

Normally a lurker, I'm hoping someone here will have had a lower back op to relieve sciatica (oops that doesn't sound right, I wouldn't wish an op an anyone) or know someone who has had one.

I'm facing the 'to op or not to op' decision and would like to hear about the recovery period and just how long I will be "incapacitated" for.

The doc says 2 nights in hospital followed by 3 weeks 'recovery' and then I would be fit to go back to work a desk job...ie sit comfortably again. Is this realistic? I'm in my 40s and am finally at a reasonable weight having shed 30lbs since Christmas

At the moment i'm relatively pain free as long as I don't have to sit for more than 5 min! I didn't realise how much of my life was spent on my posterior!!

I had to cancel a trip of my lifetime to Paducah this year ( from London :-( ) 'cos of my back (typing this standing)

Sorry for the winge, but you all have been so helpful with advice/sharing experience to others' queries....

Thanks for reading this far

Karen

Please reply privately to my email as is

Reply to
Karen
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Don't have it, don't want it, but you might read this:

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Best of luck to you.

Reply to
Pogonip

Depends on exactly where the surgery is, and exactly what it entails. Based on those numbers, I'd say he's expecting to do a fairly straightforward diskectomy through a small incision. Those estimates are probably pretty good for that procedure.

Recovery from a spinal fusion is much longer than recovery from a diskectomy. In general, the farther down the spine the surgery is, the longer the recovery will be, and spinal fusion involves a much larger incision than a diskectomy.

I had double fusion (L4-L5, L5-S1) two and a half years ago. It was probably one of the best decisions I ever made. (A diskectomy was not an option, as the vertebrae on either side of the ruptured discs were already beginning to fuse together.) Two weeks after the surgery, I was walking better than I had in a couple of years, and was pretty much back to what I considered 'normal' in eight months -- well ahead of the surgeon's prediction, but he also said that I was an outlier on his patient scales anyway (fitter than most), and he wasn't surprised.

jenn

-- Jenn Ridley : snipped-for-privacy@chartermi.net

Reply to
Jenn Ridley

Thanks for replying - especially the last paragraph...gives me a lot of hope as I thnk i'm in the disc-ectomy category. Anyone I've asked has said "go for it" so I am going to...just waiting for the date now.

Karen

Reply to
Karen

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