A Return to the Fairway

How one South Bay amateur golfer moved past years of pain and back onto the course, thanks to Providence Little Company of Mary Medical Center Torrance.

Presented by

Dr. Remi Ajiboye

Mark Weber approached spine surgery the way he approached most things: carefully, methodically and armed with research. A retired engineer, he spent more than 20 years managing back pain that steadily worsened and eventually included sciatica. He had given up his favorite sport, golf, because of the pain. By the time he scheduled his third consultation, he was looking for a surgical solution.

That’s when he met Remi Ajiboye, MD, an orthopedic spine surgeon at Providence Little Company of Mary Medical Center Torrance. Early in their conversation, Dr. Ajiboye explained how robotic guidance could support surgical planning and the precise placement of spinal hardware—technology that immediately resonated with Mark.

Dr. Ajiboye specializes in minimally invasive spine surgery and complex spinal reconstruction. For select cases, he uses the ExcelsiusGPS robotic guidance system from Globus Medical, which was made possible through the generosity of the medical center’s philanthropic community.

Mark, a meticulous woodworker and tinkerer, was impressed by the robot’s ability to guide precise hardware placement during his spine surgery. This technology offered a level of confidence he could trust.

“Dr. Ajiboye used a different technique that seemed like a much more elegant solution. Plus, he had the robot,” says Mark, who had researched back surgeries extensively on YouTube and Google. He also liked Dr. Ajiboye’s caring and communicative style.

“Excelsius improves the accuracy and safety of spine surgery and helps minimize complications,” says Dr. Ajiboye. “Little Company of Mary is the only hospital in the South Bay that offers this leading-edge technology. It allows us to execute a spine surgery in a very precise fashion. I’m talking about 1 millimeter of accuracy in terms of the placement of screws. And in the spine, we’re working with very narrow corridors with important structures like nerves, so precision is of utmost importance.”

Mark was diagnosed with severe lumbar stenosis—a condition caused by compression of the spinal nerves in the lower back, leading to pain. To relieve the pressure, Dr. Ajiboye needed to free the compressed nerves and stabilize Mark’s lower spine by fusing two vertebrae.

The procedure was performed through a few 1-inch, minimally invasive incisions in Mark’s side and back—unlike traditional open spine surgery, which involves much larger incisions. The entire surgery took about three hours.

“I was walking the day I was released from the hospital,” says Mark, who returned home to Palos Verdes the day following his surgery.

“His recovery was remarkable,” says Mark’s wife, Gale. “I went with Mark on all of his visits to Dr. Ajiboye. I got to know the doctor; he’s very personable and easy to talk to.”

After seeing Mark’s improvement firsthand, Gale decided to address her own chronic neck pain. About a year after Mark’s surgery, Dr. Ajiboye performed an anterior cervical discectomy and fusion on Gale—a 90‑minute procedure that helped alleviate her pain. Like Mark, she spent one night in the hospital before returning home, and she is rapidly regaining her strength.

Dr. Ajiboye says the Webers both took their recovery seriously, following his guidance for physical therapy and exercise. Today, Mark is pain-free, and Gale is rapidly regaining her strength.

They attend Pilates classes twice a week at a studio near their home, walk daily on Palos Verdes trails and stay committed to movement. Mark lifts weights twice a week, and he’s happy to be back on the golf course.

For him, returning to the fairway is the clearest sign that daily life no longer revolves around pain or limitation. The couple’s energetic South Bay lifestyle includes moving freely, staying active and fully enjoying the days ahead.