Spinal pedicle finder for transpedicular screw fixation--design and early clinical result

Spinal transpedicular fixation has gained widespread popularity in the past 5 years. In biomechanical studies, the deeply-inserted transpedicular screws withstood the largest number of cycles in the cephalad-caudad and medial-lateral direction before failure. However, in clinical practice, the risk of screw placement which is too far medially or too far laterally do exist. The optimization of increasing screw depth to avoid complication is of significant clinical importance. A Spinal Pedicle Finder (S.P.F) has been designed for transpedicular screws and a prototype has been completed. It is composed of an I-shaped body with a pair of front rails and a pair of rear rails. The front rail comprises two positioning arms that fit against the laminal bony crest, and the rear rail comprises two guiding bases that provide the transpedicular pin inserted with a specific angle. Both positioning arms and both guiding bases can be adjusted synchronously, and the specific angle over the guiding bases can be pre-set preoperatively according to the angle of pedicle axis. To date, in 7 cases (5 fracture and 2 spondylolisthesis) transpedicular screw fixation has been applied by aid of the S.P.F. Two-level fixation was applied in a fracture group and three-level fixation was applied in a spondylolisthesis group. The position of the transpedicular screw has been checked by CT scan postoperatively. A total of 32 transpedicular screws were inserted and all were in the pedicle and vertebral body except in one instances. One transpedicular screw was malpositioned on one side, partially lateral to the pedicle. However, this malposition did not cause any neurologic problem, such as dural tear, nerve root injury or other. Clinical experience has demonstrated its efficacy and safety.