Outcomes of Operative Treatment of Traumatic Spinal Injuries: 2-Year Follow-Up.

BACKGROUND: Spinal cord injury (SCI) is the second cause of complications and disability after brain injury. Although primary prevention is the best strategy, obtaining the necessary knowledge about the patient's condition and follow-up treatment can lead to the use of safety measures and appropriate healthcare planning. This is the basis of this study with the aim of a two-year follow-up of patients with traumatic SCI (TSCI) who underwent surgery.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: This study was a descriptive and analytical type that examined 79 patients with TSCI who had undergone surgery two years ago. The data were collected by a standard questionnaire and analyzed in Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 24 software.

RESULTS: Among the patients in our study, 39.2% of them had the initial C American Spinal Injury Association (ASIA) score followed by patients with grade D (31.6%), grade A (15.2%), and grade E (14%), respectively, and also, a most common type of vertebral column injuries is burst fractures with a prevalence of 62%, followed by fracture-dislocation injury (25.3%) and compressed fracture (12.7%). Regarding the improvement of patients according to ASIA grade, the highest percentage of improvement is seen in grad grades D (84% and 77%), and grade A patients have improved to grade B by about 33.3%. In the study conducted, 5% of patients died during 24 months of follow-up, which means 75% of the deceased patients were grade A patients at the time of admission.

CONCLUSION: As mentioned, the most important predictor of the patient's prognosis is the patient's initial condition.