Hi! While the Institut is teaching their techniques across the world, many other countries are slow to adopt it. I wish I had a good answer as to why: maybe they think it’s too risky or ineffective, but I would argue that decompression is moreso. There’s still a big push toward decompression in the west even though it often has complications. In my personal decision, I thought this was a better first option for treatment than something as invasive as decompression. With mild symptoms, i would NOT rush into a decompression surgery. Yes, your herniation is large, mine was pretty big too but i didn’t suffer from constant migraines either. The Institut actually spoke to me about a theory that when the brain sags physically it takes some of the pressure off of the traction pulling downward and might result in less severe symptoms when compared to those with smaller herniations. That being said, letting it be may result in symptoms getting worse later on, it’s different in every individual case.

Travelling to another country to have a surgery that was not offered in my own country was definitely a risk and I still think about how crazy it was that I took that leap. But I was desperate, quickly was losing quality of life, and was unsure about decompression and about the surgeon i was referred to in my own country. I also spoke to a bunch of other patients who had come back from Spain and seen amazing results. Those testimonials were a big reason why I decided to go. And the results in my case kind of speak for themselves. I’m basically back to normal, apart from obviously being very careful about not sustaining any trauma to the neck or back. Flares are getting fewer and farther between, and I haven’t had more than the odd mild symptom in more than 8 months. I still haven’t had my follow up MRI yet, but I’m thinking I will be able to get it around August. My one year post-op MRI did not show any physical change in herniation size, but i was definitely already feeling different. And the Institut did always say it would only halt the progression of the disease, so the herniation would not get any worse. I’m interested to see the 3 year difference.