How to treat pathological fractures of the vertebral body in the elderly?

  Percutaneous translaminar vertebroplasty is a new minimally invasive treatment technique in which a patient is anesthetized locally and then, under the supervision of a 360° C-arm X-ray machine, a puncture needle is inserted through the pedicle into the damaged vertebrae of the neck, lumbar and thoracic regions and a bone cement called polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) is injected into the fractured vertebrae. This technique is safe, easy to perform, and has few complications. It not only provides immediate pain relief for the fractured and diseased vertebrae, but also reinforces and rebuilds the biomechanical strength of the bone, embolizes the tumor, and controls the growth of the lesion.  The bone cement used in this technique releases heat up to 70°C during solidification, which kills the nerve endings in the lesion, resulting in the relief of persistent back pain and the restoration of body functions. This technique has remarkable efficacy not only for osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures and vertebral tumors, but also for patients with fresh vertebral fractures without significant neurological symptoms and vertebral malignancies.  This procedure has a short operation time, patients are spared the pain of incision, short hospital stay (2-7 days, average 3 days) and early dismounting (1-5 days, average 2 days). Low patient cost (equivalent to 25% of the cost of open surgery for similar diseases. Since I started this technology in 2003, I have treated nearly 500 patients with 560 vertebrae (thoracic and lumbar fractures caused by osteoporosis in the elderly, vertebral metastases caused by cancer and benign tumors of the vertebral body cervical, thoracic and lumbar vertebrae) with a maximum of 4 vertebrae treated in one operation, with the lowest surgical position to the sacral vertebrae and the highest to the cervical 5 vertebrae.