Spinal services are provided across several hospitals and Trusts within Sheffield and you will find that consultants work across several sites. Within Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, spinal surgery services are provided at The Northern General Hospital and The Royal Hallamshire  Hospital. Children and adolescents under the age of sixteen are looked after at The Sheffield Children’s Hospital.

In 2024, Sheffield Teaching Hospitals (STH) has been awarded the prestigious title of Eurospine Surgical Spine Centre of Excellence following a rigorous audit assessment conducted by independent auditors from CERTiQ (Germany). For STH to be recognised at this level demonstrates not only the world-class expertise of the surgeons and multidisciplinary teams but also our commitment to delivering high standards care to patients with spinal disorders

The Northern General Hospital

Out-patient appointments occur in the Orthopaedic Clinic on Level C, near the main entrance of Huntsman building

In-patient care predominantly takes place on Robert Hadfield wing (RH6 ward).

We have nine Spinal Consultants working at NGH: eight have a background of Orthopaedic training, and one is a Neurosurgeon. They all participate in the on-call rota that provides care to all patients in Sheffield area and take tertiary referrals from surrounding hospitals in South Yorkshire. There are three full-time consultants based at the NGH, with five working at both the Children’s Hospital and NGH, and the other consultant working at RHH and NGH.

The consultants are supported by two spinal fellows, two specialist physiotherapists, two orthopaedic registrars, a spinal nurse specialist, and foundation doctors on the ward.

Elective spinal procedures performed at NGH include nerve root injections, lumbar microdiscectomy and decompressions, all aspects of cervical spine surgery, scoliosis and kyphosis correction, thoracic discectomy, and anterior and posterior fusion of the lumbar spine.

All aspects of emergency spinal surgery are covered at NGH including infections, trauma, spinal metastases and emergency degenerative pathologies. The on-call team is closely supported by the Major Trauma Team and Orthogeriatricians.

We are closely supported by the radiology department at NGH who come to our weekly MDT meeting and perform spinal biopsies, cervical nerve root injections and vertebroplasty.

The Royal Hallamshire Hospital

The Sheffield Neurosurgical Department provides a regional neurosurgical service for a population of 2.2 million people covering South Yorkshire, North Derbyshire, and North Lincolnshire. Approximately 1500 adult and 250 paediatric neurosurgical procedures are performed annually.

The unit has 58 adult neurosurgical beds at the Royal Hallamshire Hospital, including a dedicated neurosurgical intensive care, and further paediatric beds at Sheffield Children’s Hospital.

Medical staff include 16 Consultant Neurosurgeons, each with sub-speciality interest, providing a comprehensive cranial and spinal service. 

The neurosurgical on-call team is based here, and although the majority of emergency spinal referrals will be sent to NGH, if more appropriate, certain conditions will be managed by the Neurosurgical team at RHH.

Spinal surgery performed at RHH ranges from relatively common lumbar and cervical spine decompression procedures (i.e. microdiscectomy, anterior cervical spine decompression and fusion, lumbar spine decompression) to the more complex cases which include minimally-invasive percutaneous procedures, instrumented spinal fusion, intradural spinal tumours and vascular malformations, thoracic disc herniations, dysraphism and many more which often requires multidisciplinary approach. We have outstanding collaboration with other departments (neurophysiology, orthopaedics, thoracic surgery, pain management, infectious diseases, etc) which helps to deliver best care to our patients.

Our state of the art equipment helps us to be more accurate and less invasive and often do procedures which are otherwise extremely challenging. This includes top of the range microscopes, micro-instruments, intraoperative neurophysiological monitoring, spinal navigation, intraoperative ultrasound, 3D x-ray, ultrasonic bone scalpel, CUSA, etc.

The spinal services at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals are a centre of excellence for spinal navigation and AOSPINE / EANS training centre. We are proud to have welcomed a significant number of trainees and international visiting fellows from all over the world to enhance their spinal experience and help to exchange the knowledge.

Sheffield Children’s Hospital NHS Foundation Trust

Out-patient appointments take place in the relatively new out-patient hub near the main entrance off Clarkson street. In-patients are looked after on Ward 2 which was also part of the refurbishment project in 2018. There is ample space for a parent to stay with their child during any in-patient stay.

SCH takes new referrals for any young person aged up to 16 years-old. Once they pass this age, the referrals are directed to NGH. If you require ongoing care after the age of 16, having had your treatment started at SCH, a decision will be taken as to whether or not to transfer your care to NGH. Transition of  care from children’s to adult services in spinal surgery is relatively straight forward because you can continue under the same consultant at NGH. If appropriate, we do look after 16-18 year-olds who have been referred to the adult sector at SCH, but this is on a case by case decision.

There are five paediatric spinal surgeons who work at SCH as well as NGH. Emergency referrals are directed through the on-call consultant based at NGH who covers both sites. We have a large spinal team consisting of nurse specialists and an ESP (see separate section for more details). The team is supported by a Paediatric Spinal fellow, Orthopaedic registrars, Paediatric Orthopaedic fellows, and ward based ACPs and F2s.