Patients that have problems with cervical or lumbar spine can present many different clinical pictures and image studies to should help us determine if the symptoms are provoqued by those changes.
The main symptom of spine problems is PAIN. According to the degenerative changes (which are different in each patient), the doctor should decide if according to symptoms and images there is a concordance between them in order to offer a surgery as a mode of treatment. Surgery doesn't always grant to resolve the symptoms if there is not a clinical concordance with the images.
Sometimes depending on degenerative changes we may be facing a problem for which its only solution would be fusion and it would need to be done.
Our highly trained staff works with our patients, through every step of the recovery process, ensuring their comfort and long term health. If you or a loved one are in need of lumbar or cervical spine surgery turn to Mario Alejandro Salmon Franz, MD FACS.
Cervical stenosis can be produced by different factors like vertebral deformity, abnormal growing of bone in the edges of a vertebra (osteophites or bone spurs), abnormal growing of articular phacets, ligamentum flavum overgrowing or calcification of posterior longitudinal ligament.
There are so many variants and conditions that spine surgeon has to deal with that a thorough evaluation is very important in order to offer the patient the best option.
A cervical fusion is the fusing of two or more vertebra together. The cervical spine consists of the top seven vertebrae in the spinal column, as well as eight pairs of cervical nerves. A cervical fusion is a fusion surgery performed on the vertebra in this area of the spine. Mainly, it is done when a patient has sustained trauma and the ligaments involved, the articular processes or even vertebrae are broken; the patient is not a candidate for a prothesis because of instability, then fusion is needed.
There are several approaches to achieve this, most of them reaching from the anterior part of the neck and they consist on taking away the intervertebral disc, putting a cage or autologus bone in the disc space and then a plate. According to specific injuries, the surgeon must decide whether to go anteriorly, posteriorly or both ways sometimes. There are is a wide variety of implants offered in the market, the main thing is choosing always the best for each case or patient.
Mario Alejandro Salmon Franz, MD FACS is committed to providing superior quality care to each and every patient. If you are in need of treatment for cervical or lumbar stenosis or other spinal problems, you can depend on Mario Alejandro Salmon Franz, MD FACS for all of your spinal treatment needs.
Lumbar fusion is a surgical procedure in which two or more vertebrae are fused together in order to: eliminate abnormal motion in a vertebral segment, relieve pressure on the spinal cord and/or nerve roots or to prevent kyphosis. Sometimes when doctor needs to decompress neural tissue the surgery itself takes off some parts of bone; the decompression could make the spine more unstable so it would need fusion.
The main goal in spinal surgery is to DECOMPRESS NERVOUS TISSUE and the second goal is to reestablish spinal alignment and stability.
