As demand for outpatient spine surgery continues to increase, researches routinely find outpatient lumbar and cervical spine surgery is safe and cost effective.
A study, published in Neurosurgery, examined 1,449 outpatient spine surgeries, with 1,073 lumbar and 376 cervical spine procedures. Researchers found:
1. Fifty-one minor and major complications were recorded in 51 patients, but only three patients needed to be admitted to the hospital the same day of surgery. Twenty-two patients were admitted to a hospital within three months due to surgery-related events.
2. No surgical deaths were reported and all life-threatening hematomas were discovered within six hours following cervical surgery and three hours after lumbar spine surgery.
3. Researched detected the following complications:
• Postoperative hematoma – 0.6 percent
• Neurological deterioration – 0.3 percent
• Deep wound infection – 0.9 percent
• Dural lesions with cerebrospinal fluid leakage – 1.0 percent
• Persistent dysphagia – 0.1 percent
• Persistent hoarseness 0.1 percent
• Severe pain/headache – 0.4 percent
4. In all, 99.8 percent of all patients were discharged on the same day of surgery. Researchers concluded, “The overall complication rate was 3.5 percent, surgical mortality was 0 percent and only 1.5 percent had to be admitted to the hospital within three months after surgery. The study adds to the large collection of research supported outpatient spine surgery.