Little good comes from crowded situations. Think about the discomfort of sitting in a cramped subway car, or not quite being able to zip up those favorite jeans comfortably.
The same holds true for your spinal cord. When part of this nerve cluster becomes compressed in your spinal canal, persistent pain and other unpleasant symptoms emerge.
This condition is known as spinal stenosis, and it’s mainly an age-related problem, with most sufferers being over age 50.
As an experienced and highly respected board-certified neurosurgeon, Dr. Benjamin Cohen treats patients affected by several painful conditions, from bone spurs and herniated discs to spondylolisthesis (slipped disc) and degenerative disc disease, all causes of spinal stenosis.
Fortunately, Dr. Cohen offers conservative treatments that relieve the life-limiting symptoms of spinal stenosis, but sometimes they aren’t enough to bring full relief, and a surgical solution is necessary, but in which instances?
It’s clear that anything that increases crowding by jutting into the spinal canal — like a bone spur or bulge from a herniated disc, leads to compression and symptoms that substantially reduce your quality of life. These include:
A particularly painful complication from spinal stenosis is when nerves pinch at the spinal cord’s base — this can cause leg paralysis, excruciating lower back pain, and even loss of bowel and bladder control.
Some patients don’t feel a thing as spinal stenosis develops, and imaging tests might be the only clue that something’s wrong. As the condition progresses, however, symptoms can make you quite uncomfortable and curtail your activities.
Equally vexing is the fact that spinal stenosis pain can be with you one minute and gone the next, which makes for an unpredictable, anxiety-producing way to live.
Typically, Dr. Cohen recommends conservative treatments to treat spinal stenosis initially, and they’re often successful. These treatments include anti-inflammatory medications, steroid injections, and physical therapy, which can all relieve pain and other symptoms and strengthen your spine.
Unfortunately, not every patient responds to these treatments — this is when Dr. Cohen advises surgery for spinal stenosis pain and mobility problems.
The good news is that he can tailor which surgery is best for you to the root cause of your spinal stenosis. Dr. Cohen is versed in performing innovative minimally invasive procedures, far and away superior to the spinal surgery performed many years ago.
Today, these methods require that a surgeon make only a few small incisions instead of one long one. This type of surgery is superior because it’s associated with faster recovery, less pain, reduced bleeding, and less scarring.
Here are a handful of surgical options that Dr. Cohen performs to treat spinal stenosis:
Spinal fusion connects your vertebrae to strengthen and stabilize your spine, and involves Dr. Cohen applying a bone graft that helps two bones become one over time. He uses metal screws, rods, and other components to secure your bones and keep them still as the fusion takes place during the months following your surgery.
Dr. Cohen might harvest bone fragments from your hip, use a fusion cage that contains bone growth-encouraging agents made of biocompatible material, or obtain a graft from a bone bank.
This procedure widens your spine’s opening, where the nerve roots exit your spinal canal. If they’re crowded and causing pain, Dr. Cohen can deliver relief with this targeted surgical option.
During a discectomy, Dr. Cohen trims away any parts of a herniated disc that are causing you painful symptoms. Dr. Cohen may also remove the damaged disc completely, depending on what he sees.
This surgery sees Dr. Cohen remove the top of a disc to open up room in your spinal canal so you can lose the pain and regain your full mobility.
If your spinal stenosis symptoms are severe, or if you’ve tried a range of noninvasive treatments and they haven’t worked, it’s time to have a conversation with Dr. Cohen about whether he’d advise surgery.
Call our Garden City office at 516-246-5008 to schedule a consultation with Dr. Cohen and begin your journey to a future free from pain.
