A new study published in Spine examines the impact of smoking and smoking cessation on short-term morbidity risk after lumbar spine surgery.
The study authors queried a large, multicenter, prospectively collected clinical registry dataset for patients who underwent lumbar spine surgery in 2012 and 2013. There were 35,477 cases identified with data collected for 30 days postoperatively. There were 27,246 patients who were never smokers, 562 former smokers and 7,669 current smokers included in the study.
The researchers found:
1. The current smokers reported significantly higher risk of superficial surgical site infection and overall wound complications than the never-smokers.
2. The current smokers reported significantly higher total morbidity at 30 days than the other groups.
3. Former smokers were at increased risk of 30-day morbidity, but the risk never reached significance for any tested category.
4. The patients who had a one to 20 packs per year smoking history and smokers of more than 40 packs per year reported significantly higher superficial surgical site infection risk.
5. The researchers concluded data supported future studies on smoking cessation.