When acupuncturist Julie Tillar was in a car accident last year, her whole world changed. She found herself with two ruptured discs in her neck and suffering from pain and numbness in her left arm. “The pain was with me almost all the time, and numbness made it impossible for me to continue as an acupuncturist,” Tillar said. “I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t work. It was pretty miserable.” Hoping that a more natural approach would help her, she initially turned to acupuncture for pain relief.

“It only helped temporarily,” she said. “Then it got progressively worse. The pain and numbness intensified.” Tillar had an MRI to better diagnose the cause of her pain. The image showed two ruptured neck discs pressing on her spinal cord. “I went to two doctors to see what could be done,” Tillar recalled. “One wanted to fuse the discs and the other wanted to fuse one disc and replace the other. But it all seemed so contradictory and confusing.”

While looking for a better solution, Tillar had to go through several months of insurance issues to get any treatment authorized. Then she found John Regan, MD, a nationally recognized, board-certified orthopedic spine surgeon at Saint John’s Health Center. “I felt his integrity was so strong. He was very focused and soft-spoken,” she said of meeting Dr. Regan. “He takes everything in. I felt really safe with him.” Dr. Regan recommended disc replacement to Tillar and explained the benefits of this minimally invasive spine surgery.

“Replacement surgery allows motion to be preserved,” Dr. Regan said. “You can usually begin moving a few days after surgery, and you don’t need a neck brace. A big plus is that this approach will not put stress on other discs and cause other problems.” Since the incision is very small, there is less trauma to the patient and recovery is much faster. The procedure is often done on an outpatient basis. “After only three weeks, I wasgetting my life back,” Tillar said. Her 17-year-old son, who wants to be a surgeon, asked Dr. Regan for permission to observe his mother’s surgery.“Dr. Regan said that even h couldn’t watch a relative’s surgery, but he offered to have my son watch another surgery.

That’s pretty impressive,” Tillar noted. “The remarkable thing for me was the complete cessation of pain and numbness in my left arm and hand,” she said. “I’m so grateful.” By the second month, Tillar was able to return to her job as an acupuncturist.