Cervical vertebra corpectomy decompression with preserving the posterior wall of the corpectomied vertebral body combined with titanium-meshes and AO plate fixation: a finite element analysis
Kang Zheng-yang
Wang Ke
Liu Bai-feng
Abstract：BACKGROUND: Cervical vertebra corpectomy decompression is one of the commonly used methods of anterior cervical decompression. In recent years, under the guidance of the principle of anterior cervical surgery, scholars propose the anterior cervical vertebra corpectomy decompression with preserving the posterior wall of the corpectomied vertebral body. It retains the posterior wall of the vertebral body, not only increases the stability of the cervical spine, but also increases the area of bone graft, which is conducive to the long-term fusion. At the same time, retaining posterior wall of the vertebral body can effectively prevent bone- and implant-induced spinal cord injury.OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the biomechanical stability of anterior cervical vertebra corpectomy decompression with preserving the posterior wall of the corpectomied vertebral body procedure on sheep by the establishment of finite element model with CT data.METHODS: Cervical vertebra specimens of adult sheep were selected, and scanned to capture its CT data. The geometrical model captured by CT was then transformed into finite element model through finite element software (without surgery). In the posterior wall preserving group, C4 corpectomy decompression was conducted while preserving its posterior wall followed by titanium-meshes and AO plate fixation. On the basis of posterior wall preserving group,corpectomy decompression was operated without preserving the posterior wall in another group; titanium mesh and plate were fixed. Finite element software was used to test and analyze the changes in stress and displacement of cervical vertebra under different conditions.RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: (1) The displacement was slightly small, and immediate postoperative stability was good in the posterior wall preserving group. However, the displacement and stress were not significantly different between posterior wall preserving group and posterior wall non-preserving group. (2) To sum up, a procedure preserving posterior wall of the vertebra body gains better immediate postoperative stability compared with conventional method.
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Publication Date：2017-01-01
Online Publishing Date：2025-08-15(First online date of this platform, not the publication date of the document)
Pages：7( 1723-1729 )