I fractured three lumbar vertebrae and was in a lot of pain. But I did not have the procedure. My doc said it was mainly for pain relief and that he felt the outcome was the same with or without. I read about the risks of cement leakage and also the risk of the glass-like substance making that vertebra more brittle and possibly causing adjacent vertebrae to break. Doc was reassuring on all of that, but didn't push the vertebroplasty.