The Analysis of Complications of Anterior Cervical Discectomy and Fusion

Abstract

Background: Anterior cervical discectomy and fusion (ACDF) is the gold standard in the surgical interventions of radiculopathy in cervical inter-vertebral disc herniations or cervical spondylosis. Aim: The study aimed to analyze the complications of ACDF procedures.
Methods: Retrospective work of collected database and assessing cases that underwent an ACDF in period one year. Totally, 104 cases with 133 operated levels were included. All cases had symptomatic degenerative cervical disc diseases or disc herniations between the levels of C-3/4 to C-6/C7. Epidemiological findings, the pathologies’ locations, fixation levels, complications and follow-up variables were collected.
Results: A total of 104 patients with demographic data of 53 males and 51 females (mean age 56 years ranged from 25 - 75 years). C3 - C4 lesion in 20 cases, C4 - C5 in 25 cases, C5 - C6 in 32 cases and 27 cases with more than one level were seen. Neck pain in 104 cases, radiculopathy pain in 90, arms paresthesia in 40, weakness of limbs in 4 and sphincter paralysis in 40 cases. Postoperative dysphagia was found in 104 cases and C5 root lesion in 40 cases, cage dislodgment in one case and hematoma in one case.
Conclusion: Neck Pain is the most common presenting symptom. Dysphagia is the most common postoperative complication and usually transient in most cases. C5 root lesion is not uncommon as complication of ACDF surgery