[Kirk]

In my experience the MRI is one of the less useful tools. I was told by multiple doctors that you can have an MRI with discs that look terrible, and the person has no back pain whatsoever; then you can have an MRI with discs that look okay, but the person has horrible back pain. My discs did not look all that bad - some degeneration, some tears, slight herniations, etc., but the doctors told me that the MRI was not all that uncommon, and that many folks with these conditions have no back pain.

In my opinion, the discography is the gold standard in determining what you need to do. If the discography recreates your pain, then your pain is discogenic. Something must be done to the discs, including possible removal, in order to alleviate your pain. It's pretty simple - again, in my opinion.

My situation was much like yours in that when I presented to the doctor for a routine appointment and told them about the activity I was able to keep up (running, up to half-marathons, didn't take pain meds), it seemed to make them think it was not that bad, despite the fact that I was unable to do any other sports and, like you, was terrified of hurting my back from everyday activities like going down stairs. They could see that my back was crooked from the spasms (very crooked when I had done something to it), but the U.S. doctors didn't have any answers other than triple fusion, IDET and other procedures which I did not think had a high chance of success. It wasn't until I started looking at ADR (researched it for ~3 years before surgery) and eventually talked to Dr. Zeegers that it was clear that ADR made the most sense, for me.