Journal of neurosurgery. Spine
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OBJECTIVE In spine surgery, racial disparities have been shown to impact various aspects of surgical care. Previous studies have associated racial disparities with inferior surgical outcomes, including increased complication and 30-day readmission rates after spine surgery. Recently, patient-reported outcomes (PROs) and satisfaction measures have been proxies for overall quality of care and hospital reimbursements. ⋯ Patient-reported satisfaction measures at 3 and 12 months demonstrated a significantly lower proportion of AA patients stating that surgery met their expectations (3 months: 47.2% vs 65.5%, p = 0.01; 12 months: 35.7% vs 62.7%, p = 0.007). CONCLUSIONS The study data suggest that there is a significant difference in the perception of health, pain, and disability between AA and white patients at baseline and short- and long-term follow-ups, which may influence overall patient satisfaction. Further research is necessary to identify patient-specific factors associated with racial disparities that may be influencing outcomes to adequately measure and assess overall PROs and satisfaction after elective lumbar spine surgery.
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OBJECTIVE This study investigated neurological improvements after conservative treatment in patients with complete motor paralysis caused by acute cervical spinal cord injury (SCI) without bone and disc injury. METHODS This study was retrospective. The authors evaluated neurological outcomes after conservative treatment of 62 patients with complete motor paralysis caused by cervical SCI without bone and disc injury within 72 hours after trauma. ⋯ Of the 31 patients with a baseline AIS grade of B, 12 (38.7%) patients showed at least a 1-grade improvement at the 1-month follow-up; 11 (35.5%) patients improved to grade C and 16 (51.6%) patients improved to grade D at the 6-month follow-up. CONCLUSIONS Even in patients with complete motor paralysis caused by cervical SCI without bone and disc injury within 72 hours after trauma, approximately 30% of the patients with an AIS grade of A and 85% of the patients with an AIS grade B improved neurologically after conservative treatment. It is very important to recognize the extent of neurological improvement possible with conservative treatment, even for severe complete motor paralysis.
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OBJECTIVE Spinal dural arteriovenous fistulas (dAVFs) are rare vascular abnormalities caused by arteriovenous shunting. They often form at the dural root sleeve between a radicular feeding artery and draining medullary vein causing venous congestion and edema, decreased perfusion, and ischemia of the spinal cord. Treatment consists of either surgical ligation of the draining vein or selective embolization via an endovascular approach. ⋯ No patient in this study had fistula recurrence or worsening of symptoms. Among patients with abnormal motor or ALS scores, 78% improved after surgery. Therapeutic embolization is an option for some lesions, but for cases with unfavorable anatomy where embolization is not feasible, surgery is a safe option associated with high success.
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OBJECTIVE Patient-reported outcomes are commonly used to evaluate treatment efficacy. Inefficiencies in standard measurement tools often prove to be a barrier to data collection. The Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) was developed to overcome these limitations. ⋯ In addition, PROMIS scores have strong correlations with SF-12 and ODI scores. These results suggest that PROMIS scores can be used as a valid assessment of physical function in MIS TLIF patients. Further work is required to determine the full benefits of this measure in other spine populations.
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OBJECTIVE The aim of this paper was to analyze the incidence and risk factors of proximal junctional kyphosis (PJK) in patients with ankylosing spondylitis (AS) who underwent pedicle subtraction osteotomy. METHODS The records of 83 patients with AS and thoracolumbar kyphosis who underwent surgery at the authors' institution between 2007 and 2013 were reviewed. The patients were divided into 2 groups based on the presence or absence of PJK. ⋯ CONCLUSIONS The authors found that PJK occurs postoperatively in patients with AS with an incidence of 14.5%. Risk factors of PJK include larger preoperative sagittal vertical axis, PJA, and osteotomy angle. Reducing the osteotomy angle in some severe cases and extending fusion to a higher, flatter level would be also beneficial in decreasing the risk of PJK.