METHOD FOR POSTERIOR SPINAL FUSION IN TRAUMATIC INJURIES OF UPPER CERVICAL SPINE Russian patent published in 2014 - IPC A61B17/56 

FIELD: medicine.

SUBSTANCE: what is involved is a posteromedian surgical approach to an upper cervical spine. That is followed by a subperiosteal dissection with exposing an occipital bone, a posterior arch of atlas, a spinous process and a C2 vertebral arch. A posterior atlantooccipital fixation is carried out from both sides from a body mid-line with using a polyaxial combined screw and rod fixation according to Harms-Melcher procedure. A posterior spinal fusion of C1-C2 spines follows. For this purpose, a C2 spinous process is dissected away at an attachment to the vertebral arch. The C2 spinous process is split in a section with plane extending though a mid-height from an apex of the spinous process to its base to form two extended halves having a width matching that of the spinous process until it splits, and representing two autografts having a cortical layer from one side, and a spongy bone layer - from the other side. The posterior arch of atlas and the C2 vertebral arches are decorticated; each autograft are laid on C1-C2 vertebral arches from each side on the right and on the left from the body mid-line and along to provide a contact mating of the spongy bone layers with the pre-decorticated relevant vertebral arches. The autografts are fixed to the C1 and C2 vertebral arches.

EFFECT: method enables more stable fixation of the upper cervical spine with providing the optimum conditions for the autograft osteogenic modification.

2 cl, 1 ex