Cervical Cord Decompression Using Extended Anterior Cervical Foraminotomy Technique

OBJECTIVE At present, gold-standard technique of cervical cord decompression is surgical decompression and fusion. But, many complications related cervical fusion have been reported. We adopted an extended anterior cervical foraminotomy (EACF) technique to decompress the anterolateral portion of cervical cord and report clinical results and effectiveness of this procedure. METHODS Fifty-three patients were operated consecutively using EACF from 2008 to 2013. All of them were operated by a single surgeon via the unilateral approach. Twenty-two patients who exhibited radicular and/or myelopathic symptoms were enrolled in this study. All of them showed cervical cord compression in their preoperative magnetic resonance scan images. RESULTS In surgical outcomes, 14 patients (64%) were classified as excellent and six (27%), as good. The mean difference of cervical cord anterior-posterior diameter after surgery was 0.92 mm (p