Comparison of effectiveness of kyphoplasty and vertebroplasty in patients with osteoporotic vertebra fractures

Abstract

Objective: The aim of this study was to compare the functional and radiological outcomes of vertebroplasty and kyphoplasty in patients with osteoporotic vertebra fractures.Methods: TheŞles of the patients who underwent vertebroplasty or kyphoplasty for osteoporoticvertebrae fractures were retrieved from the archives. Forty-three patients with complete follow-up datawere included in the study group. The patients were evaluated for radiological outcomes in terms of localkyphosis angle, wedging index, compression ratio, visual analog pain scale (VAS) and Oswestry DisabilityIndex (ODI).Results: In the study group, kyphoplasty was performed on 24 vertebrae of 22 patients (17 females, 5males; mean age: 73 years) whereas vertebroplasty was applied on 24 vertebrae of 21 (16 females, 5males; mean age: 74.7 years) patients. The mean follow-up time was 26 months. When the VAS and ODIvalues of the groups were analyzed, both groups showed statistically signiŞcant progress after theoperation. Radiological data showed that the kyphoplasty group showed statistically signiŞcantimprovement in the sagittal index values whereas the vertebroplasty group did not. The overallcomplication ratio was 4%.Conclusion: Both vertebroplasty and kyphoplasty are effective treatment methods for functional recovery and pain relief in osteoporotic fractures of the vertebra. Although radiological outcomes of thekyphoplasty seem to be better, this does not have any clinical relevance. We suggest vertebroplasty overkyphoplasty since it is an easier method to manage.Level of evidence: Level III, Therapeutic study.© 2016 Turkish Association of Orthopaedics and Traumatology. Publishing services by Elsevier B.V. This isan open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)