What are the chances or re-herniating after Hemi-laminectomy?

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phils95cobra

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What are the chances that after my surgery in Feb on my L5-S1 hemi-laminectomy that the disk that is left will herniate again? If the surgeon gets in there and find a ruptured disc, does this change the process of surgery and recovery much?
 
The published statistics run from 5% up to 15%.

It is important that you follow your surgeon's instructions and do not over do any activity. What often happens is that the patient has been in such pain, and then often feels immediate relief after surgery. The temptation is to want to do all those activities that have been put on hold while the patient was in pain...so the patient does too much too soon and enRAB up reherniating.

As I understand it, whether the disc is bulging or ruptured doesn't really make much difference as to how the surgeon performs the surgery.
 
Hello,

I have no idea what the percentage chance might be, but I can tell you that I am constantly getting disc herniations. I'm lucky if I go a couple months without at least one. I have had multi-level laminectomies in my low back several years ago for spinal stenosis. I also had foramenotomies done and discs removed at the same time. I went to physical therapy for about a year before and after surgery and I still do the exercises at home to try to keep my core strong. No matter what I do or how careful I am, I keep herniating. Sometimes it's reherniation of the same disc, sometimes it's other discs. So there's really now way to truly predict if you will reherniate. All you can do is keep your core strong and try to be careful of how you bend, twist, and lift things and hope for the best. Some people are like me and get it constantly, others may only get one herniation and never have a problem again. I'll definitely hope for you that you never do reherniate
 
I'm not sure about the probabilities of a reherniation, but it happened to me and I had to have a fusion after having a decompression of the same level. I also developed severe scar tissue around the nerve roots between the two surgeries. I agree with Baybreeze to keep your core strong and take PT seriously.
 
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