Objective: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of surgical reconstruction of posttraumatic deformity. Posttraumatic kyphosis (PTK) causes pain, neurological deficit, sagittal imbalance, progressive deformity, cosmetic and functional deterioration. Its treatment is cause of controversy and technically demanding. There are few reviews in the literature about the results of its surgical treatment.
Methods: From 1995 to 2002 twenty-one patients suffering from posttraumatic thoracolumbar kyphosis were operated. The average follow-up was 3.9 years (range 6 – 1 years). The average age was 38 years (range 23–62): 13 female and 8 male. All patients complained about vertebral pain, 16 located at the apex of the deformity, 2 patients in the lumbar area and 3 patients referred also pain above the lesion. Three patients had irradiated circumferential pain and 4 patients mild neurological deficit. Two patients showed sexual dysfunction. In one patient only anterior approach with allograft reconstruction and anterior plate fixation was performed. In 17 patients simultaneous or staged approach with posterior release, anterior discectomy and allograft reconstruction and posterior compressed instrumentation was performed. In three patients a posterior closing wedge osteotomy was performed
Results: Postoperative pain decreased from 7.5 to 2.8 (VAS). Functional status: preoperative 42.3 % and postoperative 13.8% (Oswestry score). There was no hardware failure. All cases showed solid fusion without significant loss of correction. The average corrected kyphosis was 27.3°. All patients were satisfied with their cosmetic result. No cavity drainage was performed in 2 patients with syringomielia. 1 of 4 patients with neurological deficit did not improve. Two patients had thoracic neuropathic postoperative pain; one of them needed pain clinic treatment until remission. One case had superficial infection. One patient showed a Chylous leakage.
Discussion: Only few works analyze the results of surgical treatment of PTK. The controvesrsy between anterior-aposterior surgery versus posterior closing wedge osteotomy depens of classification of posttraumatic spinal deformities based on three criteria: the region involved, the neurological status and the presence of any sagittal or frontal plane deformities outsides the local kyphosis
Conclusions: Our results suggest that the double approach with anterior allograft and posterior instrumentation shows clinical and radiological efficacy for sagittal posttraumatic deformity. In spite of surgical risk, there have been few complications with a high rate of patient satisfaction.
