@solom174 I am a spine surgery patient, and I see neurosurgery as an elegant specialty requiring exceptional skill, and I say that because spine surgery gave me my life back. I do not have pain, and decompressing my spinal cord gave me back the coordination in my arms. That being said, I didn't wait many years to do this and expect a miracle. I paid attention and kept notes about how my condition was progressing and I knew that nerve damage could become permanent if it went on too long. I worked with a physical therapist who did her best to keep my spine supported before my surgery. While I waited for surgery, I watched as many online spine conference videos as I could, so I learned about spine conditions and various surgical techniques and what may apply to my case, and I read journals about spine cases online. There are many different ways that surgeons solve problems and nothing is "one size fits all". My recommendation is to be an informed patient, ask a lot of questions and advocate for your care and share in decision making with your surgeon. Reputation also matters, and find the best surgeon that you can who has an interest in the problem that you have.

Research is going on at Mayo Clinic in spinal cord regeneration from traumatic injuries, but there is a lot of other research going on in the field and at the government clinic trials website you can find many clinical trials related to the spine, artificial disks, and various implants to address spine issues. Some spine issues are age related as the spinal discs dry out a bit and that is normal, but that can act on previous injuries and exacerbate a condition. Dr. Bydon, who is researching spine regeneration at Mayo, has had success with a spine trauma case and a man can now walk again who had been somewhat paralyzed. Not everyone will have this degree of recovery, but it shows the promise of what may be possible going forward. As a patient, you must learn all you can and choose wisely. You don't know what you don't know about the field of spine surgery, and that takes some investigation and asking questions. Every case is different, and surgeons cannot guarantee to fix pain. They address function, and consider surgery successful if spine function is improved or stabilized from an unstable situation. There are compromises when you choose surgery, and you make that informed choice because the benefit of surgery hopes to improve the situation and the benefit is greater than the risk. The patient also influences the success of their outcome in many ways.