I’ve heard it’s possible to have many different types of operations on an outpatient basis. Are they doing spinal fusions this way yet?

Surgeons are starting to try spine surgery on an outpatient basis. Different types of operations are being studied.

Recently surgeons at the Monmouth Medical Center in New Jersey joined in this new research. They compared the results of 30 patients who had an anterior cervical discectomy and fusion (ACDF) as outpatients with 30 inpatients.

Patients were carefully selected for the outpatient operation. The results were better than for the inpatients. There were fewer problems during and after the operation.

In the last 10 years more and more orthopedic operations have been done successfully on an outpatient basis. You can expect to see more and more of this in the near future.