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3. WJ Mixter: The Disc and Sciatica
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WJ Mixter: The Disc and Sciatica

William Jason Mixter was born in 1880 and graduated from Harvard Medical School in 1906. Following in the footsteps of his father, Mixter was a prominent surgeon at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and by 1911 father and son oversaw all neurosurgery at the hospital. After specialising for twenty years, Mixter Junior was considered to be one of the world's leading experts in spinal surgery. In 1934, at the age of 54, Mixter and Joseph S. Barr published an article on the Inter Vertebral Disc lesion in the New England Journal of Medicine. That article fundamentally changed the popular understanding of Sciatica at that time, and Mixter is generally credited by his contemporaries as being the man who clarified the relationship between the Inter Vertebral Disc and Sciatica.

The Inter Vertebral Discs are located between each of the vertebra that make up the spinal column. These discs consist of a tough outer fibrous layer that surrounds a gel-like nucleus. Repeated over-use during bending, lifting, and sporting activities can lead to degeneration of the outer layer of the disc. If this degeneration is sufficient, the nucleus material is liable to prolapse out of the disc.

As the nucleus material leaks out of the disc, the onset of pain can be sudden and severe. If the direction of the prolapse is back and to the side, it may press on what is called a 'nerve root', causing pain down one of the legs. Most commonly, the nerve roots affected produce pain in the Sciatic nerve distribution, resulting in Sciatica. This can produce pain in the buttock, the hamstrings, the back of the knee, the calf or the heel.

Recent research on Sciatica >

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