Spinal injection for back pain

Lumbar decompression surgery is a type of surgery used to treat compressed nerves in the lower (lumbar) spine. It's only recommended when non-surgical treatments haven't helped.

Filmed on 26/01/2016 RK, 58 years old female, suffering from obesity with body mass index (BMI) above 40. She could not maintain the weight loss achieved with diet and tablets. Her medical background covers pre-diabetic condition and thyroid cancer. She was offered laparoscopic (keyhole surgery) gastric bypass. Before the procedure underwent mandatory psychiatric assessment. Recovered well after the surgery. However, had persistent lower abdominal pain. CT of her abdomen was normal and as a part of assessment was offered a diagnostic laparoscopy, during which scar tissues (adhesions around small bowel were found. After the surgery she lost 27% of total body weight. However, she continued to have minor pain in the left side of the abdomen and abdominal distension.

Filmed on 06/01/2016 RH, a 33 years old female, suffering from obesity. Her medical background covers pre-diabetic condition, epilepsy and osteoarthritis. She did not maintain weight loss achieved with diets and tablets. She was offered laparoscopic (keyhole surgery) gastric bypass. Before the procedure underwent a mandatory psychiatric assessment. Also, before the procedure was found to have MRSA (methicillin resistant staphylococcus aureus) in her nose and had to have an eradication therapy with nasal ointment. She recovered well from the surgery. Started losing weight in a steady fashion and her mobility improved much since the procedure.

Mr Joseph Shalhoub, Consultant Vascular and Endovascular Surgeon talks about the important of being no the correct medication after having bypass surgery as these may have changed. He also talks about the importance of looking after the wounds in the leg from the bypass surgery.

Surgical scars is one of the main concerns for patients going under surgeries, as it can hugely affect the post surgery life of the patient significantly. Dr Joseph Shalhoub therefore gives advice on how to manage the healing process of surgical wounds to improve the outcome and appearance of surgical scars.

Surgical wounds are unavoidable for patients needing an operation to help cure their illness. The invention of less invasive surgical procedures such as key-hole surgery allow treatments with minimum surgical wounds. In this video, Dr Jaffer explains why in some cases, surgical wounds are still necessary for the benefit of the patient.