The practice was formed in early 2011 by Dr. Stephen Watson. The focus has been to treat patients who have injuries to their spine with evidence for disc herniation seen on MRI scan in the region of the spine where they have pain. The procedures effectively treat axial spine pain including neck, thoracic-region, and low back pain. This pain is called a discogenic pain.
The technique also typically results in significant and sometimes complete resolution of arm or leg symptoms such as pain, tingling and numbness. Finally, the procedure in the neck has an excellent record of relieving or eliminating headaches if the patient has one or more herniated discs in the cervical spine. Patients who have been treated are in many cases still much improved or even pain-free a number of years after the procedure was accomplished. The procedures that Dr. Watson performs do not have a standard billing code or CPT code as the procedure is relatively new and only accomplished by a select few physicians in the United States.
Dr. Watson has been performing these procedures for over 12 years. Because of a lack of a billing code, Dr. Watson treats patients who have suffered a personal injury such as a motor vehicle accident and sometimes a slip and fall. In addition,
he treats patients who have these same issues but are able to cover the cost of the procedure themselves without the help of insurance.
Dr. Watson is also active in utilizing regenerative medical techniques to treat pain in the spine as well as pain in the various joints and other soft tissue areas. He can select between use of local anesthetic and steroid medication or platelet-rich plasma, stem cells or growth factors.
His preference is to lean toward the regenerative techniques in hope of accelerating the healing process to effectively treat problems such as knee/hip/shoulder pain or peripheral soft tissue issues. He minimizes the use of steroid medications. Dr. Watson can accomplish all of the interventional procedures typically utilized by pain management physicians and surgeons. He has found that the disc procedure utilizing a thulium laser has minimized the necessity to accomplish many of the interventional procedures that other physicians typically use.
