[Lumbar disk hernia through the intervertebral foramen. Apropos of 37 surgically treated hernia].

37 lumbar discal herniations situated in the intervertebral foramen were operated on, out of a total of 525 operations for lumbar discal herniations during the same period, that is to say 7%. Perhaps the habitual negativity of the contrast neuroradiologic investigations (saccoradiculography, discography, phlebography) explains its relative rareness. In the futur, the scanner, always positif in our cases, will perhaps enable us to appreciate its exact frequency. The radicular pain may be simple in the territory of a root emerging at the upper discal level, which explains the difficulty of diagnosis. It may also interest two roots, including in that case, the root emerging at the discal herniation level. The great frequency of L4-L5 herniations explains the high number of crural pains by compression of the L4 root. Finally, crural pain, in our series of all the lumbar herniations operated on, seems to be linked to a herniation of the upper discs (L3-L4, L2-L3 : 18 cases) as often as to a herniation of the intervertebral foramen of L4-L5 (17 cases).