Microdiscectomy in Garland, Texas

Microdiscectomy in Garland

The North Garland clinic on Telecom Parkway serves patients across Garland, Richardson, Sachse, Murphy, and Wylie — many weighing a microdiscectomy recommendation made elsewhere. Dr. Jihoon Choi’s evaluation starts from the same question every time: does the disc on the MRI actually explain the leg pain? Only a clean yes earns the operation.

His framing is deliberate: microdiscectomy is a small operation for a specific problem — a disc fragment pressing on a nerve — not a treatment for back pain in general. Done through a corridor often under an inch, it removes only the offending fragment and preserves the disc, the motion, and the stability around it. The evaluation exists to confirm the problem is that specific.

Other clinics: Rockwall · Forney · Greenville

About microdiscectomy

A microdiscectomy removes the herniated portion of a lumbar disc that is compressing a nerve root, using an operating microscope through a small incision — typically about an inch. Only the fragment (and any loose material behind it) comes out; the healthy disc stays, and nothing is fused. Most patients go home the same day, and leg pain often improves immediately as the nerve is freed.

Candidacy is the whole operation’s foundation: leg-dominant pain that has not yielded to an adequate conservative trial, progressive weakness, or an unmistakable disc-nerve match on examination and MRI. Back-dominant pain without leg symptoms is generally not a microdiscectomy problem — operating on the wrong pain generator is how good operations get bad reputations.

Treatment options

Before any operation, the standard course is conservative: activity modification, anti-inflammatory medication when appropriate, and guided physical therapy over 6 to 12 weeks, with a targeted epidural injection from a pain management colleague when pain blocks progress. Many herniations settle in that window. Microdiscectomy is discussed when leg pain remains disabling despite that trial, or when weakness is progressing and waiting carries its own risk.

Recovery is measured in weeks, not months: walking the day of surgery, light activity within days, and a gradual return to full duty over 4 to 6 weeks as the nerve recovers. A fusion is almost never needed for a first-time herniation — it enters the conversation only with instability or deformity, a separate structural problem from the disc fragment itself.

Certain symptoms should not wait: new bowel or bladder changes, numbness in the saddle area, or rapidly worsening leg weakness can signal cauda equina syndrome — compression of the nerve bundle at the base of the spine — and warrant prompt evaluation rather than watchful waiting.

Second opinions in Garland

Told elsewhere that your disc needs operating on now? A second opinion at the North Garland clinic checks whether the proposed level matches your leg pain’s path and whether a conservative trial has truly been exhausted. Bring your MRI; an independent read often finds the operation was right but the timing was wrong — or that it was never needed.

Related care

Microdiscectomy · Lumbar disc herniation · Sciatica / radiculopathy · Second opinions · Garland clinic

From Back Talk: Microdiscectomy Recovery: What the First 6 Weeks Look Like · What Is an Endoscopic Discectomy?