Neurosurgery Resident Westchester Medical Center Valhalla, New York, United States
Introduction: Lateral minimally invasive corpectomy is becoming increasingly employed. In this systematic review, the authors survey studies employing minimally invasive lateral thoracolumbar corpectomy to characterize the current state of the literature.
Methods: The authors conducted a systematic literature review of the PubMed and MEDLINE databases for studies published between 1986 and 2020. Studies employing minimally invasive lateral corpectomy were included for analysis.
Results: Our literature search yielded 37 full-text articles. This resulted in a total of 847 patients (548, 64.9% males). Surgeries were most commonly employed at the thoracolumbar junction (T11-L2) (74.2%). The weighted mean age was 44.7 (SD 10.2, 30-76) years, with a weighted mean follow-up of 26.8 (SD 14.34, 5-47.4) months. The most common indication for surgery is traumatic burst fracture (69.4%), with most patients experiencing some neurologic deficit (59.8%) and back pain (59.3%) on presentation. Following surgery, a large percentage of patients experience improvement in these symptoms (65.6% and 62.2% for back pain and neurological deficits, respectively).
Conclusion : Spine surgery is trending toward greater use of minimally invasive approaches due to shorter recovery times and quicker return to function. Based on the current state of the literature, minimally invasive lateral corpectomy appears to be an effective treatment option in the setting of multiple pathologies including trauma, neoplasm, infection, and degenerative/disc disease processes. Given the minimal morbidity and mortality associated with this technique, minimally invasive lateral corpectomy is a safe treatment option, and the authors believe it will be increasingly employed as the technique is further refined. However, prospective studies of higher quality with larger sample sizes are necessary to provide more definitive data in this domain of spine surgery.
