Authors: Shanming Chen Lin Cai
Publish Date: 2016/11/07
Volume: 475, Issue: 1, Pages: 288-288
Abstract
Each author certifies that he or she or a member of his or her immediate family has no funding or commercial associations eg consultancies stock ownership equity interest patent/licensing arrangements etc that might pose a conflict of interest in connection with the submitted articleWe read the article by Mehren and colleagues 2 with great interest In their study the authors found that the risk of vascular complications after oblique lumbar interbody fusion is lower compared to the reported risk for anterior midline approaches Additionally the risk of neurologic complications after oblique lumbar interbody fusion is lower than what has previously been reported using the extreme lateral transpsoas approachThe study observed five superficial 062 and six deep 074 hematomas 2 Still questions remain We do not know the levels assigned to risk of retroperitoneal hematoma and infection Additionally we were curious as to why the transmuscular approach may have a slight increase of postoperative retroperitoneal hematomas 1In their study the authors suggest that the oblique psoassparing approach is lower than the risk of vascular complications with the midline approach which ranges from 19 to 15 2 This is likely due to use of access lateral to the abdominal vessels with the oblique psoassparing approach All three vessel lacerations in the series involved the L4–L5 segment and the authors recommend careful and meticulous preparation and more posterior dissection of the anterior border of the psoas muscle 2 We agree with the authors that there is no relationship between the risk of vascular complications and the oblique psoassparing approach 3
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