The first local patient to undergo the procedure described her quick turnaround from a life of constant pain.

Trish Smith believes life is lived best outdoors.

"I've been active all my life with hiking, climbing, horseback riding, bicycling," said Smith.

But she says the lifestyle eventually took a devastating toll on her back. For a year and a half, her pain intensified.

"It felt like an open nerve (was) running down both of my legs, and I was no longer able to walk," said Smith.

Finally doctors told her she needed spinal fusion surgery, a risky procedure to remove her damaged disc through an incision in her abdomen. Full recovery would take months.

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"It was amazing. I was told that I might have to be in the hospital six or seven days," said Smith.

Instead, Smith became the first in our region to undergo a minimally-invasive back procedure pioneered in Brazil.

"This technology has caught on immediately, because it hasn't just been me that has recognized the value of this. This is being done all over the world now," said Smith.

In the new procedure doctors access the spine through two small incisions in a patient's side. Computer-guided instruments steer the surgeon through a muscle and safely past vital nerves and organs

Smith's doctor then replaced her disc with a small cage containing a special protein which grows new bone.

"So we don't have to harvest bone from the hip, which is the classical means of obtaining bone graft for fusions," said Dr. Richard Wohns, a neurosurgeon.

"I was up the next day walking, pain free," said Smith.

Two days after surgery Smith was home from the hospital. Instead of recovery taking months, she was exercising in just four weeks, and back working on her farm.

"I feel like I have my life back again," said Smith.

Thousands of people could be helped by the new back procedure. To find out if it's right for you, talk with your doctor.