Analysis of the structure of revision interventions in elderly and senile patients with degenerative pathology of the lumbar spine
Authors: Klimov V. S. , Evsyukov A. V. , Khalepa R. V. , Ryabykh S. O. , Amelina E. V. , Markin S. P. , Vasilenko I. I. 
Published: May 2021

The study objective is to study the causes of repeated surgical treatment in patients of an older age group with degenerative pathology of the lumbar spine.

Materials and methods. A retrospective analysis of the treatment of 962 patients who underwent surgical treatment of degenerative pathology on the basis of the FCN of Novosibirsk from 2013 to 2017. A total of 360 men, 602 women; average age 66 years. 624 (64.9 %) patients underwent decompression, 338 patients (35.1 %) underwent stabilizing intervention in combination with decompression. The study group consisted of 98 (10.2 %) patients who underwent repeated operations taking into account the inclusion and exclusion criteria. On average, the period after the previous intervention is 17 months (from 1 day to 6 year). 68 patients (69.4 %) previously underwent decompression interventions, 30 (30.6 %) rigid stabilization. The indication for revision treatment was the presence of pain and (or) neurological deficiency, resistant to treatment for at least 6 weeks. Evaluation criteria are described, and the structure of complications is analyzed. The minimum follow-up period after repeated surgery was 1 year, the maximum 6 years.

Results. Iatrogenic factors were detected in 39 patients (39.8 %). Progression of degenerative pathology in 59 (60.2 %) patients. More often, repeated intervention was performed at the level of L4–L5 (36.1 %), the cranial adjacent segment was 76.5 %, and the caudal segment was 23.5 %. The minimum period of manifestation of continued degeneration is 3 months. The development of the disease of the adjacent segment after fixation is higher in the period of 3–4 years (p = 0.015). Patients with repeated surgical treatment after decompression for continued degeneration had a higher BMI of 32.3 (p = 0.12), as well as patients with damage to the adjacent segment 32.5 (p = 0.10), compared with the group of primary patients (BMI 30.6 on average). The similar dependance is registered for patients after stabilization: BMI of patients with repeated interventions is 34.5 that is higher than BMI of primary interventions group (on average 33.2, р = 0.13).

Conclusions. The main reason for repeated interventions in patients of an older age group is the progression of degenerative pathology on the segments on the segment operated as as well as the adjacent segments (60.2 % repeated interventions, 46.9 % at the adjacent level including).

Repeated surgical treatment of patients of an older age group in the early period (for up to 1 year) is most often due to insufficiently effective primary surgical intervention with prevailing early recurrence of disk herniation (1.6 % patients of total number of primarily operated). In the long term (more than 3 years), the reason for repeated surgical treatment is due to the development of an adjacent segment disease where the number of operations of patients with primarily made rigid fixation is increasing progressively in the course of time.

High BMI is a predictor of the development of instability of the vertebral motor segment and continued degeneration of the operated one as well as the adjacent level in the long follow-up time.