Any one ever had a anterior cervical fussion operation?

I went to a surgeon today and he wants me to get thi done, I dont think its safe after reading about it anyone have any info for me

Answers:
if you are having any doubts to having this surgery done i would recommend against it. i'm guessing the reason the dr is recommending it is because you have a disc problem: degenerative disc disease, herniated disc, arthritis, etc. the problem with doing this type of surgery is that because it's a fusion it causes whatever vertebral joints they are fusing to become one. so now instead of 2 or 3 joints you are left with one big block. this causes strain on the other joints directly above and below the fusion because they have to work that much harder to compensate for the fusion--in doing so, they wear out at an accelerated rate and eventually (5-10 yrs later) will need to have surgery on them as well. most importantly, there is no guarantee the surgery will work in the first place. most surgeries of these type have 3 outcomes: 33% get better, 33% stay the same, and 33% get worse. not odds i would want to take.

i am a chiropractor and would recommend checking out a newer type of treatment called spinal decompression. many of my patients are in your type of situation looking for alternatives to surgery. this type of therapy is non-invasive and is very successful (86% success rate) for disc problems. i use the DRX9000 spinal decompression system which is the only system that is fda approved--so i would recommend finding someone with this machine (there are other cheap knockoffs out there).

this is something that you can at least try before doing surgery, because once you do surgery--there's no going back and decompression is no longer an option. so i would highly recommend trying this route first. you can find all kinds of info about the DRX9000 on the web--just search it on google.

i've had many patients myself that were in your shoes or even scheduled for surgery and tried this treatment as a last resort--about 95% of them did not have to do surgery after completing the treamtment. good luck and ice that neck!!

well it does depend on the surgeon who does it as they are good ones and not so good ones but take it from me if you trust your doctor i would go for it if you are having alot of pain and it is perfectly safe not a real high risk i have had it done and post surgery and a few months recovery and i will have to say i am doing much better for it
I have not but I am a nurse on an orthopedic unit, so I care for people who have this done.
It depends on the doctor. Why does he want you to have this done? Are you having a lot of problems or pain? if so, it might be in your benefit. I haven't had any patients with severe injury after having this done if that eases your nerves a little bit.
There are risks, as with any surgery. The risk of nonhealing, the risk of your body not accepting the proceedure and it having to be redone, and the risk of damage to your throat. As a nurse, I have only had two patients with problems such as these in the 2 yrs that I've been on my unit. One had an infection that just didn't want to go away but she wouldn't keep her fingers off the incision (and that can lead to infections if your hands are not clean) and the other ended up having to have them do a redo on his because he went out and played tackle football five weeks after surgery and messed something up in there.
You have to weigh your options. If you have it done, how might it benefit you. less pain if you r having pain, increased strength to your arms if you are having weakness, etc versus living with the pain or weakness.
Do some research on your doctor. Find out what the success rate of his surgeries are (do his patients normally heal up good, no problems; or do his patients get infections or postoperative problems frequently)
Hope this helped a bit.
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