Sciatica is not back pain. It is a nerve being crushed, and it announces itself down the leg, in the foot, at three in the morning. ACCESS connects you with fellowship-trained spine surgeons at accredited private facilities for the operation that takes the pressure off, and tells you honestly if your disc is likely to settle without one.
Performed through a small incision under a microscope or a tube, under general anesthesia.
Hospital Stay
Same day to 1 night
Many patients walk within hours and go home the same day. Where a night helps, we arrange it.
Back to Desk Work
1 to 2 weeks
This is the fastest recovery in spine surgery. Physical work takes longer, usually four to six weeks.
Time to Surgery
Weeks, not years
Consultation within days, and no waiting months for the MRI that has to come first.
What is a microdiscectomy?
Between each pair of vertebrae sits a disc: a tough outer ring with a soft centre. When the ring tears, some of that centre pushes out, and if it lands on a nerve root the nerve does what nerves do. It screams, and it screams down your leg.
A microdiscectomy removes the fragment that is pressing on the nerve. It does not remove the whole disc, and it does not rebuild your spine. Through an incision of a couple of centimetres, using a microscope or a small tube to see, your surgeon lifts the nerve gently aside, takes out the piece of disc sitting on it, and closes. The nerve is free, and the leg pain very often goes with it, sometimes before you have left the recovery room.
It is the smallest and most predictable operation in spine surgery, and the one with the clearest target. That is precisely why it works.
What it is good at, and what it is not. A microdiscectomy is an operation for leg pain. It relieves the nerve compression that causes sciatica, and it does that well. It is not an operation for back pain, and if back pain is your main complaint, a disc fragment may not be the thing to blame. Any surgeon who offers to fix both with the same operation should be asked to explain how.
Wait it out, or operate? Time is the deciding factor.
Here is the thing a surgical website is not supposed to tell you: most herniated discs get better on their own. The question is not whether that is true. It is how long you have already been waiting.
Conservative Care
Waiting It Out
Your body can dissolve a herniated disc fragment. Immune cells find it, treat it as debris and clear it away. The bigger and more dramatic the herniation looks on your scan, the more likely it is to disappear entirely.
Best for
Sciatica in its first weeks to months
Involves
Movement, physiotherapy, pain control, sometimes an injection
Outlook
Most people improve substantially within three months
Cost to you
Time, and the pain you live through while you wait
Not for
Progressive weakness, or any loss of bladder or bowel control
Surgery
Microdiscectomy
The fragment is taken off the nerve. Relief of leg pain is usually rapid and often dramatic, and the recovery is short by the standards of spine surgery.
Best for
Sciatica that has not settled, or that is getting worse
Targets
Leg pain, numbness and nerve weakness
Relief
Often immediate, sometimes on waking up
Recovery
Desk work in one to two weeks
Trade-off
It is still an operation, and a small number re-herniate
Where the evidence actually lands. In the first weeks, waiting is usually right, and a good spine surgeon will tell you so. But the calculation changes once sciatica settles in. A Canadian randomised trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine looked at patients whose sciatica had already lasted between four and twelve months, and found that those who had surgery had better leg-pain relief six months later than those who carried on with conservative care. Being straight about it: by two years the gap between the two groups had narrowed, partly because many of the patients assigned to keep waiting eventually had surgery anyway. Several other studies link a longer run of leg pain before surgery with a slower or less complete recovery, though that evidence is mixed. The honest summary: early on, wait. After several months of it, waiting stops being treatment and starts being just waiting, and surgery buys you back the months you would otherwise spend in pain.
CANDIDACY
Are you a candidate for microdiscectomy?
The best candidate is not the person with the worst-looking MRI. It is the person whose symptoms match the MRI exactly, and whose pain runs down the leg.
Microdiscectomy may be right if you have
Leg pain that is worse than your back pain, following a clear nerve path
An MRI showing a disc fragment on the nerve that explains your symptoms
Sciatica that has persisted despite six or more weeks of proper conservative care
Numbness, pins and needles, or weakness in the foot or leg
Pain severe enough that you cannot work, sleep or live around it
What your surgeon will assess
Whether your MRI findings actually match the nerve your symptoms come from
How much of your pain is leg and how much is back, honestly separated
How long you have had it, and whether it is improving or worsening
Your strength and reflexes, tested rather than assumed
Whether more time, or an injection, is still the better answer
One thing that is not a waiting matter. If you develop numbness around the groin or buttocks, or you lose control of your bladder or bowels, that can indicate cauda equina syndrome. Go to an emergency department immediately. Do not book a consultation, do not wait for a call back. For everything else, ask a coordinator.
Your recovery, step by step.
This is the good news part. By the standards of spine surgery, a microdiscectomy recovery is short, and the leg pain relief often arrives before the recovery even starts.
DAY 1
Surgery Day
Up and walking within hours. Many patients notice the leg pain has already gone, which is a strange and very welcome feeling.
WK 1–2
Home & Moving
Short walks, several times a day. Desk work often resumes in this window. No heavy lifting, no deep bending, no twisting.
WK 4–6
Building Back
Physiotherapy steps up and driving usually returns. Physical and manual work typically resumes toward the end of this period.
MO 3
Restrictions Lift
Most limits come off. The disc has healed as much as it is going to, and the focus shifts to the core strength that protects it.
MO 6+
Full Return
Sport, heavy lifting and demanding work return. Any residual numbness continues to improve slowly, over months.
Timelines are typical ranges, not promises. Two honest points. First, nerves that have been compressed for a long time can take months to recover fully, and some numbness may be permanent, which is one of the reasons not to leave severe symptoms for years. Second, the disc you had surgery on can herniate again, most often in the first few months, and a small proportion of patients need a second operation. Your surgeon will explain your specific risk, and ACCESS coordinates your physiotherapy close to home.
What does private microdiscectomy cost in Canada?
There is no single price for a microdiscectomy, and any website that hands you one is quoting a case it has never seen. Your cost is shaped by your spine, your surgeon and your plan.
Rather than post a number that may have nothing to do with your situation, we do something more useful: we review your imaging and your history, then give you one written, all-inclusive quote before anything is booked. The figure you approve is the figure you pay.
How many levels. A single disc at one level is a different operation to two, and it is priced accordingly.
The technique. Microscope, tubular retractor or endoscope. Your surgeon chooses what suits your anatomy.
First operation or revision. Operating on a level that has been operated on before is more demanding.
The facility and province. Operating room and facility fees differ across the network.
Imaging you still need. If you are waiting on an MRI, arranging it is part of the plan and part of the quote.
Worth asking your coordinator about: third-party financing is available through established partners, and some private medical expenses may qualify for the Canada Revenue Agency's Medical Expense Tax Credit. Certain extended health plans also cover related costs such as physiotherapy. We will walk you through all of it.
Set out separately, never buried: travel and accommodation where needed, and anything outside the surgical package such as ongoing physiotherapy. You see every line before you commit. No hidden fees, ever.
Microdiscectomy questions.
Straight answers to what patients ask us most about private microdiscectomy in Canada.
There is no single price, because no two spines are the same. Your cost depends on how many levels are involved, the technique used, whether this is a first operation or a revision at a level that has been operated on before, the facility, and any imaging you still need. Instead of quoting a range that may not apply to you, ACCESS reviews your imaging and history and gives you one written, all-inclusive quote covering the surgeon, anesthesia, the facility, any overnight stay 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.
There are two waits, and people usually only count the second one. Nothing can be decided until you have an MRI, and the Fraser Institute's 2025 report put the median Canadian wait for an MRI at 18.1 weeks. Only then do you join the queue for the surgeon. Spine surgery is not among the procedures for which Canada sets national wait-time benchmarks, so it is not nationally tracked, but the specialties that perform it carry the two longest waits in Canadian medicine: neurosurgery at a median of 49.9 weeks from family doctor referral to treatment, and orthopedic surgery at 48.6 weeks.
Very possibly, and this is the part patients are rarely told. The body can reabsorb a herniated disc fragment: immune cells treat it as debris and gradually clear it away. Counterintuitively, the large, angry-looking herniations are often the ones most likely to shrink. Most people with sciatica improve substantially within about three months without surgery, and only a minority end up needing an operation. That is why a good spine surgeon will usually tell you to wait first. The picture changes if the pain does not settle, if it is getting worse, or if you develop weakness, and it changes completely if you lose bladder or bowel control, which is an emergency.
Probably not, and we would rather you knew that before surgery than after it. A microdiscectomy is designed to relieve nerve compression, which means it is aimed at your leg pain. It is very good at that. Back pain has many possible sources and a disc fragment sitting on a nerve is often not the main one, so back pain frequently persists to some degree afterward. If back pain is your dominant symptom rather than leg pain, a microdiscectomy may be the wrong operation for you, and the right answer may be no operation at all.
Fast, by spine surgery standards. Most patients are walking within hours and home the same day or the next. Desk work commonly resumes in one to two weeks, and physical or manual work in about four to six. The leg pain is often gone immediately, which surprises people. What takes longer is nerve recovery: numbness and weakness improve gradually over months, and a nerve that has been squeezed for a very long time may not recover completely. Your surgeon will give you a plan specific to you.
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 for an MRI, say so, because for a disc problem that scan is the thing everything else depends on, and it is usually the first bottleneck we can clear.
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 follow-up care close to your home. Because this recovery is short, most patients travel home within days.
Related procedures.
A disc is not the only thing that compresses a nerve. Explore the other spine procedures we coordinate.
Spine
Laminectomy & Decompression
For spinal stenosis, where a narrowing canal squeezes the nerves and steadily shortens how far you can walk.
Speak with a care coordinator about your sciatica, your imaging and your options. No referral needed, no obligation, and an honest answer even if that answer is to give it more time.
