I often get asked a lot by my patients, for their cervical hernia disc, which they should pick an artificial disc replacement or a fusion. Certainly the trend has been more towards artificial disc replacement over the years. It’s hard to compare these two very, very successful procedures over a 10 year span.
There just aren’t that many patients that we can look at at a 10 years to see who’s really doing better. It’s compounded by the fact that both procedures have a very high success rate. The procedures are almost identical in terms of risk technique.
Everybody can get a fusion. It’ll always fit. You can always see well enough to do a fusion.
A disc replacement can be a little finicky as to who it will fit in and who you can visualize on X-ray well enough to put a disc replacement in.