Nerve pain does not respond to patience. ACCESS connects you with fellowship-trained spine surgeons at accredited private facilities, and tells you honestly whether an operation is the answer, because for a great many people with back pain, it is not.
Nothing in spine care moves until somebody has looked inside your back. In Canada, getting that image is its own queue, and it sits in front of the queue for the surgeon.
The median Canadian wait for an MRI scan, which is the test almost every spine decision depends on.*
The longest median wait of any specialty in Canadian medicine, from family doctor referral to treatment.*
Consultation within days, and surgery typically scheduled within weeks of it rather than a year later.
*Fraser Institute, Waiting Your Turn 2025, a survey of Canadian physicians. Neurosurgery carried the longest median wait of any specialty at 49.9 weeks from GP referral to treatment, with orthopedic surgery second at 48.6 weeks. Spine surgery is performed by surgeons from both specialties. The median wait for an MRI was 18.1 weeks. Spine procedures are not among the priority procedures Canada reports wait-time benchmarks against, so they are not nationally tracked. Waits vary widely by province. Individual ACCESS timelines depend on the procedure, your medical readiness and surgeon availability.
Spine surgery is not one thing. What matters is which structure is causing your symptoms, and whether an operation can actually reach it.
A disc pressing on a nerve root sends pain down the leg, often with numbness, pins and needles, or weakness. This is the situation spine surgery handles best, because there is a specific thing compressing a specific nerve, and it can be taken off.
Explore MicrodiscectomyThe spinal canal narrows and squeezes the nerves inside it. The signature is a walking distance that keeps shrinking: you set off fine, then your legs get heavy, and you have to sit or lean on something before they will work again.
Explore Decompression SurgeryBack pain on its own is the hardest problem in this field and the one surgery helps least reliably. We say that plainly. Where an operation earns its place is when the pain comes with instability, deformity or nerve compression that imaging can actually point to.
Explore Spinal FusionThe same problems occur higher up. A disc or bone spur in the neck can compress a nerve going into the arm, or press on the spinal cord itself. Cord compression is one of the few situations in spine care where waiting is genuinely unwise, and it needs assessing quickly.
Ask About Neck SurgeryThree operations, in ascending order of how much they ask of you. A good spine surgeon reaches for the smallest one that will solve the problem, and no further.
The smallest and most reliable spine operation. A fragment of herniated disc is removed from the nerve it is pressing on, and the leg pain usually goes with it.
Learn MoreRoom is made for nerves that have been squeezed by a narrowing canal. The target is your walking distance, and for most patients that is what comes back.
Learn MoreThe biggest operation here, and the one to be most careful about. Two vertebrae are permanently joined. It solves instability, and it costs you motion at that level forever.
Learn MoreMost back pain never needs an operation. Send us your imaging and your story, and a spine surgeon will tell you what is actually going on, including if the answer is to wait.
Ask a CoordinatorBecause nerve compression has a clock on it, and because the answer to the question you are actually asking is worth more than another year of waiting to ask it.
The most useful thing on this page. Spine surgery is far better at relieving leg pain than back pain. When a disc or a narrowed canal is compressing a nerve, taking the pressure off is a mechanical fix and the results are good. Back pain on its own has many possible sources, imaging often cannot tell you which one is to blame, and surgical outcomes are correspondingly less predictable. A surgeon who does not draw that distinction for you is not doing their job.
Imaging is arranged as part of your pathway, so the scan stops being the thing standing between you and an answer.
Royal College certified surgeons whose practice is the spine, not surgeons who take the occasional back.
Working through small openings rather than large ones generally means less blood loss and a shorter stay, with the same long-term result.
If conservative treatment is still the right answer, or if a smaller operation will do, we will tell you. That is the whole point of asking.
From your first message to your recovery at home, one coordinator manages the entire journey.
Tell us where the pain goes and share any imaging you have. No referral is required to begin.
Meet a fellowship-trained spine surgeon by secure video, typically within days, and get a straight answer.
We schedule your procedure at an accredited facility and coordinate travel and every other detail.
Follow-up and rehabilitation are arranged near you, with your surgical team involved throughout.
Straight answers to what patients ask us most about private spine surgery in Canada.
There is no single price, and the spread here is wider than in almost any other specialty, because a microdiscectomy and a multi-level fusion are not remotely the same undertaking. Cost is shaped by the procedure, how many levels are involved, whether implants and hardware are used, the facility and the length of your stay. ACCESS reviews your imaging and history and gives you one written, all-inclusive quote covering the surgeon, anesthesia, the facility, any implants and our coordination. Nothing is booked until you have that number and you are comfortable with it. Financing options and the CRA Medical Expense Tax Credit may also apply.
Long, and doubly so, because there are two queues. Spine surgery is not among the procedures for which Canada sets national wait-time benchmarks, so it is not tracked the way hips and knees are. What is measured is the specialty: the Fraser Institute's 2025 report found neurosurgery had the longest median wait of any specialty in Canadian medicine at 49.9 weeks from family doctor referral to treatment, with orthopedic surgery second at 48.6 weeks. Spine surgeons come from both. On top of that sits the MRI, with a median wait of 18.1 weeks, and until you have that scan nothing can be decided at all.
Most people with back pain do not, and we will tell you so. The great majority of back pain settles with time, movement, physiotherapy and sensible pain management, and surgery has little to offer it. Where surgery genuinely helps is when a nerve is being compressed and the symptoms show it: pain running down a leg or arm, numbness, weakness, or a walking distance that keeps shrinking. Surgery becomes urgent, rather than optional, in the rare cases of progressive weakness, spinal cord compression, or loss of bladder and bowel control. That last one is an emergency and you should go to hospital, not fill in a form.
This is the most important question on the page, and the honest answer is that it depends on where the pain is. Spine surgery is considerably better at relieving leg pain caused by nerve compression than it is at relieving back pain itself. When a disc fragment or a narrowed canal is squeezing a nerve, removing the pressure is a mechanical solution to a mechanical problem, and the results are usually good. Back pain on its own can come from discs, joints, muscles or ligaments, imaging frequently cannot say which, and surgery aimed at it is less predictable. Expect your surgeon to separate your leg pain from your back pain and tell you what each one is likely to do.
It means reaching the spine through small openings, working between muscles rather than stripping them off the bone, using a microscope, a tube or an endoscope. The evidence is consistent that it means less blood loss, smaller wounds and often a shorter stay. The evidence is also consistent that long-term pain and function end up much the same as with a well-performed open operation. So it is a real advantage, but a modest and mostly short-term one, and it is not the right choice for every anatomy or every problem. Anyone selling it as a different category of result is overselling it.
No referral is required to begin. Contact us directly, share any imaging or reports you already have, and we will arrange your consultation with a fellowship-trained spine surgeon. If you are still waiting on an MRI, tell your coordinator, because in spine care that is almost always the first thing standing in the way.
Yes. Travelling within Canada for privately funded surgery is a legitimate, well-established pathway, and coordinating it is exactly what ACCESS does. We arrange your consultation, your surgery date, your travel and accommodation, and we coordinate your follow-up and rehabilitation close to home.
Speak with a care coordinator about your back, your leg pain and your options. No referral needed, no obligation, and an honest answer even when that answer is to wait.
