Workers’ compensation patients are known to be associated with inferior outcomes following lumbar surgery. We investigated demographics and clinical characteristics between the reoperative and non-reoperative group of patients undergoing decompression-alone lumbar surgery (discectomy and/or laminectomy) for on-the-job injuries (OJI) at our institute, and evaluated its possible impact on the reoperation-free survival (RFS).A retrospective analysis of patients undergoing lumbar surgery for OJI between 2003 through 2010 by a single surgeon (A.N.) was performed. A comparison of baseline clinical and demographic parameters between the two groups was compared using Fisher's exact test for the categorical variables and the independent t-test (2-tailed) for the continuous variables. Overall, RFS was presented in Kaplan–Meier curves and the RFS difference was compared using log-rank (Mantel–Cox) test. Cox proportional hazard model was used for the univariate and multivariate analysis and hazard ratios with 95% confidence intervals were reported.About 92 patients with mean age 48.07±10.10 years and mean follow-up of 36.4 (range 24.3–66.0) months were included. About 38 (41.3%) patients underwent reoperation for failed decompression-alone procedures whereas the non-reoperative cohort comprises 54 (58.7%) patients. Female gender (p=0.015) and history of previous surgery (p=0.05) were associated with a higher chance of reoperation. Majority of the reoperations (20/38, 52.6%) were performed within the first 2 years, with a RFS at the end of 2 years being 78.3% (n=72) and 58.9% (n=53) at 5 years. Cox-regression analysis did not demonstrate any influence of patients and treatment-related factors on the RFS.There is a substantial risk of redo surgeries following decompression-alone lumbar procedures for OJI. As patient and treatment-related factors did not influence the reoperation rates and RFS in this study, it appears that workman compensation status of patients is inherently associated with poor outcomes following spine surgeries.