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Purpose Delayed cerebral ischemia (DCI) is a frequent cause of morbidity and mortality in patients with cerebral vasospasm (CV) following aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage (aSAH). Refractory CV remains challenging to treat and often leads to permanent deficits and death despite aggressive therapy. We hereby report the feasibility and safety of stellate ganglion block (SGB) performed with a vascular roadmap-guided technique to minimize the risk of accidental vascular puncture and may be coupled to a diagnostic or therapeutic cerebral angiography. Methods In addition to a detailed description of the technique, we performed a retrospective analysis of a series of consecutive patients with refractory CV after aSAH that were treated with adjuvant roadmap-guided SGB. Clinical outcomes at discharge are reported. Results Nineteen SGB procedures were performed in 10 patients, after failure of traditional hemodynamic and endovascular treatments. Each patient received 1 to 3 SGB, usually interspaced by 24 h. In 4 patients, an indwelling microcatheter for continuous infusion was inserted. First SGB occurred on average 7.3 days after aSAH. SGB was coupled to intra-arterial nimodipine infusion or balloon angioplasty in 9 patients. SGB was technically successful in all patients. There were no technical or clinical complications. Conclusion Adjuvant SGB may be coupled to endovascular therapy to treat refractory cerebral vasopasm within the same session. To guide needle placement, using a roadmap of the supra-aortic arteries may decrease the risk of complications. More prospective data is needed to evaluate the therapeutic efficacy, durability, and safety of SGB compared with the established standard of care.

BackgroundThe treatment of severe osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures (VCFs) with middle-column (MC) involvement, high fragmentation, large cleft and/or pedicular fracture is challenging. Minimally invasive 'stent-screw-assisted internal fixation' (SAIF) can reduce the fracture, reconstruct the vertebral body (VB) and fix it to the posterior elements.ObjectiveTo assess feasibility, safety, technical and clinical outcome of the SAIF technique in patients with severe osteoporotic VCFs.Methods80 treated vertebrae were analyzed retrospectively. Severe VCFs were characterized by advanced collapse (Genant grade 3), a high degree of osseous fragmentation (McCormack grade 2 and 3), burst morphology with MC injury, pediculo-somatic junction fracture, and/or large osteonecrotic cleft. VB reconstruction was evaluated on postprocedure radiographs and CT scans by two independent raters. Clinical and radiological follow-ups were performed at 1 and 6 months.ResultsSAIF was performed at 28 thoracic and 52 lumbar levels in 73 patients. One transient neurological complication occurred. VB reconstruction was satisfactory in 98.8% of levels (inter-rater reliability 96%, κ=1). Follow-up at 1 month was available for 78/80 levels and at 6 months or later (range 6–24, mean 7.9 months) for 73/80 levels. Significant improvement in the Visual Analog Scale score was noted at 1 and 6 months after treatment (p<0.05). Patients reported global clinical benefit during follow-up (Patient’s Global Impression of Change Scale 5.6±0.9 at 1 month and 6.1±0.9 at 6 months). Fourteen new painful VCFs occurred at different levels in 11 patients during follow-up, treated with vertebral augmentation or SAIF. Target-level stability was maintained in all cases.ConclusionsSAIF is a minimally invasive, safe, and effective treatment for patients with severe osteoporotic VCFs with MC involvement.

ObjectivesTo describe a new technique to obtain minimally invasive but efficient vertebral body (VB) reconstruction, augmentation, and stabilization in severe osteoporotic and neoplastic fractures, combining two pre-existing procedures. The implant of vertebral body stents (VBS) is followed by insertion of percutaneous, fenestrated, cement-augmented pedicular screws that act as anchors to the posterior elements for the cement/stent complex. The screws reduce the risk of stent mobilization in a non-intact VB cortical shell and bridge middle column and pedicular fractures. This procedure results in a 360° non-fusion form of vertebral internal fixation that may empower vertebral augmentation and potentially avoid corpectomy in challenging fractures.Procedure detailsThis report provides step-by-step procedural details, rationale, and proposed indications for this procedure. The procedure is entirely percutaneous under fluoroscopic guidance. Through transpedicular trocars the VBS are inserted, balloon-expanded and implanted in the VB. Over k-wire exchange the transpedicular screws are inserted inside the lumen of the stents and cement is injected through the screws to augment the stents and fuse the screws to the stents.ApplicationsThis technique may find appropriate applications for the most severe osteoporotic fractures with large clefts, high-degree fragmentation and collapse, middle column and pedicular involvement, and in extensive neoplastic lytic lesions.ConclusionsStent-Screw-Assisted Internal Fixation (SAIF) might represent a minimally invasive option to obtain VB reconstruction and restoration of axial load capability in severe osteoporotic and neoplastic fractures, potentially obviating the need for more invasive surgical interventions in situations that would pose significant challenges to standard vertebroplasty or balloon kyphoplasty.

Anterior Visual Pathway (aVP) damage may be linked to diverse inflammatory, degenerative and/or vascular conditions. Currently however, a standardized methodological framework for extracting MRI biomarkers of the aVP is not available. We used high-resolution, 3-D MRI data to generate a probabilistic anatomical atlas of the normal aVP and its intraorbital (iOrb), intracanalicular (iCan), intracranial (iCran), optic chiasm (OC), and tract (OT) subdivisions. We acquired 0.6 mm 3 steady-state free-precession images from 24 healthy participants using a 3 T scanner. aVP masks were obtained by manual segmentation of each aVP subdivision. Mask straightening and normalization with cross-sectional area (CSA) preservation were obtained using scripts developed in-house. A probabilistic atlas (“aVP-24”) was generated by averaging left and right sides of all subjects. Leave-one-out cross-validation with respect to interindividual variability was performed employing the Dice Similarity Index (DSI). Spatially normalized representations of the aVP subdivisions were generated. Overlapping CSA values before and after normalization demonstrate preservation of the aVP cross-section. Volume, length, CSA, and ellipticity index ( ε ) biometrics were extracted. The aVP-24 morphology followed previous descriptions from the gross anatomy. Atlas spatial validation DSI scores of 0.85 in 50% and 0.77 in 95% of participants indicated good generalizability across the subjects. The proposed MRI standardization framework allows for previously unavailable, geometrically unbiased biometric data of the entire aVP and provides the base for future spatial-resolved, group-level investigations.

BackgroundVertebral hemangiomas are incidental and typically, asymptomatic lesions of the spine, present in 10–12% of the population. However, aggressive vertebral hemangiomas (AVHs) can compromise the spinal canal, leading to spinal cord or nerve root compression, and require timely treatment to prevent permanent neurological deficits. Surgical management is challenging owing to the high vascularity of AVHs, and carries a significant risk of perioperative blood loss. Intraosseous ethanol injection is commonly used for sclerotization, but may not adequately deal with epidural components.ObjectiveTo carry out a staged treatment with an image-guided puncture and ethanol injection of the epidural component in 12 patients.MethodsWe retrospectively analyzed 12 patients with symptomatic AVHs who underwent targeted epidural ethanol injection followed by vertebral body cement augmentation, between 2017 and 2024, at three tertiary hospitals. Data collection included pre- and post-treatment imaging and clinical outcomes.ResultsAmong 12 patients (mean age 50, women 50%), all had extensive epidural involvement and were symptomatic, including spinal cord compression and pain. Reduction in size of more than 75% of the epidural hemangioma was achieved in 8 cases, with 11 patients experiencing complete symptom resolution. Laminectomy was performed in 3 cases, while corpectomy was avoided in all cases. Two patients had neurological worsening, with one achieving complete resolution and the other having mild residual impairment after rehabilitation due to a small spinal cord ischemic lesion. No other major complications occurred.ConclusionDirect epidural ethanol injection provides a minimally invasive alternative to surgery, such as corpectomy, including rapid size reduction of the compressive epidural component, and potentially, prevents retrograde flow into arterial collaterals. Adding vertebroplasty enhances vertebral stability.

Vertebral compression fractures are one of the most relevant clinical consequences caused by osteoporosis: one of the most common treatment for such fractures is vertebral augmentation through minimally invasive approaches (vertebroplasty or balloon-kyphoplasty). Unfortunately, these techniques still present drawbacks, such as re-fractures of the treated vertebral body with subsidence of the non-augmented portions or re-fracture of the non-augmented middle column at the junction with the augmented anterior column. A novel minimally-invasive augmentation technique, called Stent-Screw Assisted Internal Fixation, has been recently proposed for the treatment of severe osteoporotic and neoplastic fractures: this technique uses two vertebral body stents and percutaneous cannulated and fenestrated pedicular screws, through which cement is injected inside the expanded stents to achieve optimal stents' and vertebral body's filling. The role of the pedicle screws is to anchor the stents-cement complex to the posterior column, acting as a bridge across the middle column and preserving its integrity from possible collapse. In order to evaluate the potential of the new technique in restoring the load bearing capacity of the anterior and middle spinal columns and in reducing bone strains, a Finite Element model of an osteoporotic lumbar spine has been developed. Both standard vertebroplasty and Stent-Screw Assisted Internal Fixation have been simulated: simulations have been run taking into account everyday activities (standing and flexion) and comparison between the two techniques, in terms of strain distribution on vertebral endplates and posterior and anterior wall, was performed. Results show that Stent-Screw Assisted Internal Fixation significantly decrease the strain distribution on the superior EP and the cortical wall compared to vertebroplasty, possibly reducing the re-fracture risk of the middle-column at the treated level.

•Operators are exposed to variable radiation doses upon CT-guided spine procedures.•Operator’s doses correlate with the dose-length product (DLP).•An estimate of the operator’s dose may be obtained after each procedure. To perform a pilot study to quantify the radiation dose incident on operators during CT-guided interventional spine procedures, and provide a quick method to approximate it based on the total amount of radiation reported by the CT scanner. Data retrospectively obtained from 26 consecutive CT-guided spine procedures, encompassing a variety of interventions. Intermittent low-dose limited-coverage CT-scanning performed using a \"step and shoot\" mode to visualize needle advancement. The operator wore an electronic direct dosimeter to record the dose measured above the operator's lead apron [μGy] for each procedure. Total amount of radiation used for CT-guidance quantified by the Dose-Length Product (DLP) [mGy-cm] provided by the CT scanner. The relationship between the operator's dose and the DLP was assessed. Average and median operator's dose were 2.3 and 1.9 μGy, respectively, with half of these values ranging between 0.7 and 2.5 μGy. Average and median DLP values used to perform the CT-guided procedure were 58 and 54 mGy-cm respectively, and half of these values ranged between 38 and 68 mGy-cm. There was a statistically significant correlation between the operator's dose and the DLP used to perform CT-guidance (r = 0.61), with an operator's dose-DLP conversion factor of 0.04 μGy / 1 mGy-cm (range: 0.006-0.083 μGy / 1 mGy-cm). In our series, the average amount of radiation used during CT guided procedures was about 50 mGy-cm (DLP), and the corresponding average operator's dose was about 2 μGy. We showed how an approximate estimate of the operator's dose could be obtained right after each procedure, based on the CT-scanner DLP output.

Background and Objectives: We describe a novel technique for percutaneous tumor debulking and cavity creation in patients with extensive lytic lesions of the vertebral body including posterior wall dehiscence prior to vertebral augmentation (VA) procedures. The mechanical cavity is created with a combination of curettage and vacuum suction (Q-VAC). Balloon kyphoplasty and vertebral body stenting are used to treat neoplastic vertebral lesions and might reduce the rate of cement leakage, especially in presence of posterior wall dehiscence. However, these techniques could theoretically lead to increased intravertebral pressure during balloon inflation with possible mobilization of soft tissue tumor through the posterior wall, aggravation of spinal stenosis, and resultant complications. Creation of a void or cavity prior to balloon expansion and/or cement injection would potentially reduce these risks. Materials and Methods: A curette is coaxially inserted in the vertebral body via transpedicular access trocars. The intravertebral neoplastic soft tissue is fragmented by multiple rotational and translational movements. Subsequently, vacuum aspiration is applied via one of two 10 G cannulas that had been introduced directly into the fragmented lesion, while saline is passively flushed via the contralateral cannula, with lavage of the fragmented solid and fluid-necrotic tumor parts. Results: We applied the Q-VAC technique to 35 cases of thoracic and lumbar extreme osteolysis with epidural mass before vertebral body stenting (VBS) cement augmentation. We observed extravertebral cement leakage on postoperative CT in 34% of cases, but with no clinical consequences. No patients experienced periprocedural respiratory problems or new or worsening neurological deficit. Conclusion: The Q-VAC technique, combining mechanical curettage and vacuum suction, is a safe, inexpensive, and reliable method for percutaneous intravertebral tumor debulking and cavitation prior to VA. We propose the Q-VAC technique for cases with extensive neoplastic osteolysis, especially if cortical boundaries of the posterior wall are dehiscent and an epidural soft tissue mass is present.

Background Spontaneous intracranial hypotension (SIH) is a debilitating condition requiring effective treatment; however, objective data on treatment response are scarce. Purpose To assess the suitability of the brain MRI-based SIH score (bSIH) for monitoring treatment success in SIH patients with a proven spinal cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) leak after microsurgical closure of the underlying dural breach. Methods This retrospective cohort study included consecutive SIH patients with a proven spinal CSF leak, investigated at dedicated referral centre January 2012 to March 2020. The bSIH score integrates 6 imaging findings; 3 major (2 points) and 3 minor (1 point), and ranges from 0 to 9, with 0 indicating low and 9 high probability of spinal CSF loss. The score was calculated using brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) before and after surgical treatment of the underlying CSF leak. Headache intensity was registered on a numeric rating scale (NRS) (range 0–10). Results In this study 52 SIH patients, 35 (67%) female, mean age 45.3 years, with a proven spinal CSF leak were included. The mean bSIH score decreased significantly from baseline to after surgical closure of the underlying dural breach (6.9 vs. 1.3, P  < 0.001). A decrease in the NRS score was reported (8.6 vs. 1.2, P  < 0.001). Conclusion The bSIH score is a simple tool which may serve to monitor treatment success in SIH patients after surgical closure of the underlying spinal dural leak. Its decrease after surgical closure of the underlying spinal dural breach indicates restoration of an equilibrium within the CSF compartment.

IntroductionDiscogenic pain is the cause of pain in 26%–40% of patients with for low back pain. Consensus about treatment of chronic discogenic low back pain is lacking and most treatment alternatives are supported by limited evidence. The percutaneous implantation of hydrogels into the nucleus pulposus represents a promising regenerative intradiscal therapy. The hydrogel ‘GelStix’ is composed primarily of hydrolyzed polyacrylonitrile and acts as a reservoir of hydration, producing increased pressure and improved pH balance, potentially leading to disc preservation. We hypothesise that treatment with GelStix will lead to greater reduction in pain intensity at 6 months post-treatment compared with patients receiving sham treatment.Methods and analysisThis is a parallel group, randomised sham-controlled double-blind, multicentre trial to assess whether the GelStix device is superior to sham in reducing pain intensity in patients with chronic discogenic low back pain. The study will be conducted in two regional hospitals in Europe. Seventy-two participants will be randomised in a 1:1 ratio. The primary outcome will be the change in pain intensity between preoperative baseline and at 6 months postintervention. Secondary outcomes were disability, quality of life, the patient’s global impression of change scale, the use of pain medication and the disc degeneration process assessed by means of MRI. For change in pain intensity, disability, health-related quality of life and disc height, mean values will be compared between groups using linear regression analysis, adjusted for treatment centre.Ethics and disseminationEthics approval was obtained from the Ethics Committee of the Canton Ticino, Switzerland (CE2982) and by the Medical Ethical Committee Arnhem-Nijmegen, the Netherlands (2016-2944). All patients that agree to participate will be asked to sign an informed consent form. Results will be disseminated through international publications in peer-reviewed journals, in addition to international conference presentations.Trial registration numberNCT02763956.Protocol version7.1, 18 November 2020.