Stereotactic Vertebroplasty for Spinal Metastases with Multilevel Bilateral Pedicle Fractures: A Technical Note

Vertebral compression fractures (VCFs) represent a significant cause of disability and primarily result from either underlying vertebral body neoplasms or osteoporosis. Vertebroplasty (VP) is a procedure commonly utilized to repair pathologic VCFs in order to manage pain and reinstate vertebral body height. However, there is a paucity of literature on how to manage painful multilevel VCFs with concomitant bilateral pedicle fractures. We describe a patient with a primary prostatic carcinoma and VCFs of the third and fourth lumbar vertebrae (L3 and L4, respectively) with concomitant bilateral pedicle fractures secondary to metastatic disease. Due to the degree of damage to the L3 and L4 vertebral bodies and pedicles, a VP performed via a percutaneous approach was deemed to be too high risk. VP for L3 and L4 was instead performed by utilizing stereotactic spine navigation and an intraoperative O-arm (Medtronic Corporation, Minneapolis, Minnesota). Our result indicates a potential role for stereotactic spine navigation in vertebroplasty for complex pathologic VCFs.