The relationship between bone canal diameter and facet tropism in cases of lumbar spinal stenosis

Lumbar spinal stenosis (LSS) is a condition that increases in frequency with the aging of the spine and has adverse effects on the quality of life of individuals. Facet tropism (FT) refers to the difference in the orientation of the facet joints relative to each other in the sagittal plane. This situation may be due to a developmental defect or different stimuli. In many biomechanical studies in the literature, the relationship between FT and lumbar degenerative disorders has been investigated. In this study, we aimed to investigate whether there is a relationship between anteroposterior bone canal diameter and FT in LSS cases.

We retrospectively evaluated the CT and T2-weighted axial and sagittal magnetic resonance imaging of the lumbar region of 100 LSS patients who were operated on in our clinic between 2015 and 2017. For each patient, the facet joint angles, the degree of FT, and the AP diameter of the spinal canal were determined.

The cases were grouped according to FT types and no correlation was found between midsagittal bone spinal canal measurement and FT types. According to the results, no significant difference was found.

As a result, because of there is no relationship between midsagittal bone canal diameter and FT, we thought that FT may be both a part of the degenerative process and a congenital origin.