Today we helped Michael, an 18 yo young man with severe double curve with documented progression and back pain.
We were able to get an excellent correction.
He did well through surgery, and was sleeping soundly when I came by to check on him in his private room, with his mom in bed next to him.
His instrumentation was from T5-L4, and his bone quality was excellent.  I have some special techniques for screw and rod insertion and rod bending that allows us to get the spine back into excellent alignment in both the sagital (side view) and coronal (back to front view) plane.
Fortunately, because he was still fairly young his curve was relatively flexible, which helped us to get a great correction.
His surgery took about 5 hours, and he was transfused one unit of blood, plus cell saver.  His surgery was a bit more complex, due to his huge size, including huge paraspinal muscles (He’s 6 ft 4 in tall!)
His postop hemoglobin is excellent, and his evoked potential monitoring was normal throughout surgery.
Tomorrow, we’ll get him up.
He was already around 6 ft 4 inches, and now will probably be a couple inches taller!
His mom and girlfriend were very happy to see his new X-ray and hear that he did well through surgery.

After finishing his surgery, I saw my preop patient for tomorrow’s surgery, who came up from Charleston, SC, who needs a complex anterior/posterior revision reconstruction.

Late afternoon, we helped a woman with severe spinal stenosis and spondylolisthesis and rheumatoid arthritis with a L2-5 decompression and fusion.

Our 13 scoliosis from Monday goes home tomorrow morning, waiting for her bowels to fully awaken.  Otherwise she is doing great, comfortable, and walking the halls w/ her mom.
Monday’s spondylolisthesis and stenosis correction patient went home, doing well.

Our big kyphosis correction from yesterday is doing very well, extubated this AM in ICU, and will get up tomorrow to try out her new posture.

Lloyd A. Hey, MD MS
https://www.heyclinic.com
Hey Clinic for Scoliosis and Spine Surgery
Raleigh, NC  USA
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