Re-Engineering Lumbar Microdiscectomy: From the Bench to the Bedside

This thesis explores ways to re-engineer lumbar discectomy surgery, the most commonly performed spine surgery in the word, via pre-clinical and clinical investigation. The preclinical investigation consists of developing a large animal model of the post lumbar discectomy intervertebral disc and developing a new therapy for disc degeneration using mesenchymal progenitor cells, a type of adult stem cell, pre-treated with the drug pentosan polysulfate. The clinical investigation consists of a survey of Australasian neurosurgeons characterising their lumbar discectomy practices and the protocol for a clinical trial investigating the role, if any, of activity restrictions following lumbar discectomy.