Spine

When the IDE “Ideal Patient” No Longer Matches Real Practice A 66-year-old former distance runner came in with neck pain that undermined her work and daily life. On paper, she violated several pillars of the classic disc replacement “ideal patient”…

In healthcare, partnerships between insurers and physicians are often announced with optimism and framed as transformative, yet many fail to achieve sustained alignment due to competing incentives. Orthopedics, with its high-cost procedures and deeply ingrained emphasis on physician autonomy, has…

Aaron Clark, MD, PhD, performed the first case with Carlsmed’s corra cervical plating system, according to a Feb. 18 news release. The corra plating system is designed to stabilize the spine during fusions and is made with patient-specific plates. Anatomical…

Independent spine surgeons face some unique financial challenges that their employed peers might not encounter. On top of clinical work, independent spine physicians grapple with the costs of running a business and keeping up with margins. Spine physicians from different…

Spinal neurosurgeon John O’Toole, MD, was named chair of the neurological surgery at Chicago-based Rush University, according to a Feb. 17 LinkedIn post. Dr. O’Toole previously worked as co-director of neurosciences at Rush, a position he’s held since 2021. In…

Neurosurgeon Nikhil Murthy, MD, and orthopedic spine surgeon Takashi Hirase, MD, of University of California Sand Diego Health, performed the world’s first spinal tumor case using icotec’s CMORE cervicothoracic system, according to a Feb. 17 LinkedIn post. The CMORE CT…

A 42-year-old construction worker sits across from me in clinic, MRI in hand, convinced he needs surgery. His primary care doctor told him he has a “bad disc.” A friend had a fusion and swears by it. He’s Googled his…

Devan Higginbotham, MD, performed his first case with the Simplify cervical disc replacement implant at Saint Agnes Medical Center in Fresno, Calif., Globus Medical said in a Feb. 13 LinkedIn post. The patient had neck pain, shoulder pain and radiating…

Medicare’s spinal-deformity-specific diagnosis-related group distribution has some limitations when it comes to understanding the nuances of surgeries, according to a study in the March 1 edition of Spine. Five things to know: 1. The analysis included 314 adult patients who…

Endoscopic spine surgery has been growing steadily in the U.S., but a barrier to surgeon adoption is its learning curve. A systematic review published in the March 2026 issue of The Spine Journal examined the learning curves for uniportal and…