Irvine Spine

Dr. Nitin Bhatia, a Board Certified Orthopaedic Surgeon and Fellowship Trained Spinal surgeon, serves as Director of the Combined Spine Program and Chief of the Orthopaedic Spinal Surgery Service at the University of California, Irvine.

For all of our patients, a holistic, individualized approach is used. This approach allows the majority of our patients to improve without surgical intervention. When surgery is necessary, Dr. Bhatia's extensive training in state of the art techniques including minimally invasive surgery, endoscopic discectomy, percutaneous fusions, X-Stop lumbar stenosis treatment, Bone Morphogenetic Protein (BMP), and kyphoplasty help to cure his patients' problems with minimal recovery time and less discomfort than other methods.

Dr. Bhatia has been featured as a treating surgeon in the television show "Guardian Angels, MD" seen nationwide on The Learning Channel (TLC) as well as programs on PBS. He has expertise in all areas of spinal pathology including spinal stenosis, disc herniations, spine trauma, scoliosis, complex cervical and lumbar reconstruction, and failed back syndrome. Dr. Bhatia has completed multiple spine surgery fellowships and has trained in both orthopaedic and neurosurgical techniques.  Dr. Bhatia is a member of multiple international and national spine related organizations including the North American Spine Society and the highly selective Cervical Spine Research Society which has less than 20 members in the state of California.

Dr. Bhatia graduated with honors from Stanford University, after which he attended Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. During medical school, Dr. Bhatia won numerous research awards and was the valedictorian of his graduating class. Following his Orthopaedic surgery residency at UCLA, Dr. Bhatia completed a spine surgery fellowship at the University of Miami/Jackson Memorial Hospital, after which he completed a second spine surgery fellowship at Miami Children’s Hospital. Dr. Bhatia is active in multiple research projects including federally funded spinal cord injury research and has been nominated for the prestigous Russell Hibbs research award by the Scoliosis Research Society.

The Irvine Spine Center provides care for Orange County and the surrounging communities including Irvine, Newport Beach, Corona del Mar, Laguna Nigel, Garden Grove, Fountain Valley, Santa Ana, Fullerton, Westminster, Huntington Beach, Costa Mesa, Long Beach, Anaheim, Brea, Mission Viejo, Temecula, Fallbrook, Hemet, Los Angeles, and Riverside. Patients from outside these communities are welcome at the UCI Spine Center as well. International patients are encouraged to contact us for assistance and coordination of medical care.  Dr. Bhatia and his staff are fluent in multiple languages including Spanish, Vietnamese, and Romanian.