An article published in Spine examines two-year follow-up for surgical treatment for thoracolumbar fracture-dislocation.
The study examines 61 patients with acute fracture-dislocation of the thoracolumbar joint from March 2010 to December 2011. The patients were assigned to a combined postanterior fusion and transforaminal thoracic interbody fusion. Twenty-seven patients underwent TTIF and 30 underwent posteroanterior fusion.
There were 57 patients who completed the two-year follow-up with 27 patients who underwent TTIF and 30 who underwent posteroanterior fusion. The researchers found both procedures had similar:
• Fusion rate
• Decompression extent
• Loss of correction
• Instrumentation failure rate
• American Spinal Injury Association score
• Visual Analogue Score
• Oswestry Disability Index
But there was a difference in blood loss, operating time and perioperative complication rate; they were greater in the posteraoanterior fusion patients than the TTIF group.
"Our findings suggest that TTIF allows for safe interbody fusion and circumferential decompression requires only a posterior approach, and is associated with a lower incidence of surgery-related complications," concluded the study authors.