[Use of the halo-gravitation-extension in preoperative preparation in severe scoliosis]

Severe and fixed scoliosis needs a preoperative extension treatment to attain a good result of correction by spondylodesis. Halo-up-extension is a very simple, comfortable and successful method to prepare patients with a severe scoliosis for operation. From January 1981 to July 1989 we carried out the preoperative halo-up-Extension treatment at 45 patients. 39 of them had a severe scoliosis with a cobb-angle of more than 70 degrees. The correction by halo-up-Extension runs on an average of 35% of the total correction.