Originally Posted by titanx5

Hey, if you are really thinking about back surgery, you should probably at least see a neurosurgeon. Although both orthopods and neurosurgeons do spine surgery, trust me I would ask a neurosurgeon first.
Regarding the possiblity of fusion and you had prior surgery, it all depends on what kind of surgery you had the first time such as Diskectomy vs Microdiskectomy vs laminectomy vs foraminotomy and partial vs total.
The standard of care for disk/back problems is always conservative first with few days of rest then out of bed and mobilize plus anti-inflammatory, and it that fails then surgery. Also, you symptoms now might be due to a different level disk. It is true that if you are young and you get fusion then in time you can get level crep where the adjacent levels will be prone to more force and damage. But there are many people who had fusions in the 20's due to other reasons (trauma) and not have any problems 20 years later.

Another thing is that depending on the cause of your problem, which your MRI will show the level, and if due to disc if it's one side or not. Because now there is an artifical disk that can be placed. It's in the market now but of course only a few spine surgeons do it and very specific indications.

Reading the previous reply, just want to say that what other people have gone through will be totally different than what you are going through and it's hard to get an opinion about medical issues. Also, laminectomy is not surgery on the disk.

You being in Socal, you have access to some of the best spine surgeons in the country. I can give you a few suggestions if you want.

Wish you luck