S. Negrini, S. Donzelli, G. Jurenaite, F. Negrini, F. Zaina


December 2021, Volume 30, Issue 12, pp 3498 - 3508 Original Article Read Full Article 10.1007/s00586-021-06889-y

First Online: 06 June 2021

Purpose

In conservative early onset scoliosis treatment, interest in bracing is growing because repeated general anaesthesia (required by casting) has been questioned for possible brain damages. We aimed to check the results in the medium term of bracing, comparing idiopathic (IIS) to secondary (SIS) infantile scoliosis.

Methods

We performed a retrospective study in a consecutive prospective cohort. Inclusion criteria were: discovery of scoliosis and bracing below age 3; exclusion criteria: previous spine surgery, less than three consultations. We considered the following results: full ( 29°); partial (progression > 5°) and full (fusion) failure; statistics: ANOVA for repeated measures; linear mixed effect model with Cobb angle (dependent), time and diagnosis (independent) variables.

Results

We included 34 infants (16 IIS and 18 SIS) of age 1·10 ± 0·10 (years·months), 44 ± 17° curves, 27 ± 10° rib vertebral angle difference, average observation 5·05 ± 3·03 years. We found progressive improvement of IIS and stability of SIS patients. Six IIS (37.5%) and one SIS (6%) reached brace weaning before puberty with 13 ± 5° (improvement 61 ± 15%, p

Conclusion

Bracing shows promising results in the medium term for high-degree IIS, with very few hold-ups (19%) and failures (12%). Conversely, failures prevail for SIS (full 11%), even if the partial failure (39%) is still a time-buying strategy.


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