[annapurna]

Originally Posted by nolefan954

Reading the stories here, it doesn't seem like too many people had a smooth recovery after the surgery so I want to be 100% sure I need this.

First, I agree that you shouldn't get surgery if you don't need it. On the other hand, you should glance over the huge number of people who post a few times, have a successful surgery and disappear from the board. This board is a good solid representation of the breadth of what you can expect pre-surgery and a reasonable selection of post-surgical problems. It isn't a reasonable representation of success rates because many who have good successes go back to living their lives and rarely post again. I'd suggest reading the board to know what you should ask but seek real success statistics in the refereed papers mentioned on the board and with your surgeon.