We found that, in general, baseball players had the longest average career length after lumbar discectomy (4.8 years) [
8], whereas NFL athletes played for 3.1 years [
9], and NHL athletes played for 2.6 years on average after lumbar discectomy [
17]. Two studies compared the career length after operative versus nonoperative treatment for LDH. They both found no significant differences in career length after treatment [
10,
17]. In terms of postoperative performance, elite athletes who underwent lumbar discectomy were able to perform at 64.4% to 103.6% of baseline of their baseline preoperative level based on statistical outcomes.
The variability depended on the sport played with hockey players having the largest decline in postoperative performance and football players showing a slight improvement in performance after lumbar discectomy.