DECEMBER - 20208In My OpinionMEDICAL SPINE CARE: HAVE WE FINALLY ARRIVED?Michael Geraci, Medical Director, Comprehensive Spine Program, Catholic HealthByWhy would a specialty ever want to be described by what they do not do? This is exactly what happened for many years and to some extent still continues when describing an aspect of spine care not delivered by a spine surgeon. Let me give you an example. When I began to co-direct a mid-year spine meeting for the North American Spine Society (NASS), the largest spine society in the world, about 10 years ago our sessions were divided into three distinct areas named joint, surgical, and non-operative. Since we had four surgical co-directors and two physiatrist co-directors, I politely asked them why our sessions are called non-operative spine. After a brief discussion, we all agreed that moving forward our sessions will be described by what we do and not by what we do not do. Therefore, the term medical spine was used going forward.Ever since the first disc surgery article was published in 1934, by Mixter and Barr,
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