Hi all,

Quick question for everyone and any feedback much appreciated. I have a pinched nerve (I think the NS said 'bone spur') and I have lost a lot of strength in my left triceps, so the NS has suggested surgery. I still have some pain in my left shoulder and arm and numbness in my fingers, but it is nowhere near as bad as it was.

Anyways, I am planning to schedule the surgery for a couple of weeks from now.

He said that he will be doing a partial discectomy to relieve the pressure from the nerve and having done a bit of reading, I am a little bit concerned that he didn't mention anything about laser surgery or doing a microdiscectomy. Should I be concerned? Are those better options than the partial discectomy? I read that Andy Murray and a couple of other athletes had microdisectomies.

I am a little bit confused so would be really grateful for any advice.

Thanks!

If you're wondering about it now, I think it's worth looking into because you may still be wondering after it's too late.

Some surgeons specialize in one—or a very few—procedures. This means they can get very good at that procedure, but—like the carpenter with only a hammer—they may tend to see every problem as a nail. I don't know if your NS falls into that category or not.

To find out if microdiscectomy is an option/appropriate for you, I think you may need to see a surgeon who does that procedure, or a NS who has no vested interest in one procedure over another. A second opinion at the very least (and possibly more depending on the first two).

Bottom line—I wouldn't go under the knife (or laser) until I had answers acceptable to me (even if they were, "I don't know") to every question I had, and confidence that the surgeon and procedure were the right (best) ones for me. If not, and things don't happen to go as planned, this kind of thing can haunt a person for a very long time.

Doc