Why don they do Selective Dorsal Rhizotomy in the UK?
Well, they do and they don’t. They certainly perform an operation at the Robert Jones & Agnes Hunt Hospital in Oswestry which is called SDR, but the similarities between that procedure and Dr Park’s start to end there. The UK procedure is a 6-7 level traditional laminectomy (follow this link, it isn’t pretty) and recovery time is 6-7 weeks. The operation is also far more conservative too, with only the s1 root bundle being selectively cut. This means that if the patient is a toe-walker who ambulates with walking aids, the chances are that they will still need these aids, but their GAIT and walking speed may improve slightly. What? That is a major operation for such small gains. In my opinion SDR is too powerful a resource to use for such small gains – like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut. This is also why the selection criteria is so tight at Oswestry, because they want children over 6 years old that are already ambulating independently. I think this is dangerous in itself, because
