Predicting osteoporotic fractures post-vertebroplasty: a machine learning approach with a web-based calculator

The aim of this study was to develop and validate a machine learning (ML) model for predicting the risk of new osteoporotic vertebral compression fracture (OVCF) in patients who underwent percutaneous vertebroplasty (PVP) and to create a user-friendly web-based calculator for clinical use.

A retrospective analysis of patients undergoing percutaneous vertebroplasty: A retrospective analysis of patients treated with PVP between June 2016 and June 2018 at Liuzhou People's Hospital was performed. The independent variables of the model were screened using Boruta and modelled using 9 algorithms. Model performance was assessed using the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC_AUC), and clinical utility was assessed by clinical decision curve analysis (DCA). The best models were analysed for interpretability using SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) and the models were deployed visually using a web calculator.

Training and test groups were split using time. The SVM model performed best in both the training group tenfold cross-validation (CV) and validation group AUC, with an AUC of 0.77. DCA showed that the model was beneficial to patients in both the training and test sets. A network calculator developed based on the SHAP-based SVM model can be used for clinical risk assessment ( https://nicolazhang.shinyapps.io/refracture_shap/ ).

The SVM-based ML model was effective in predicting the risk of new-onset OVCF after PVP, and the network calculator provides a practical tool for clinical decision-making. This study contributes to personalised care in spinal surgery.