ABSTRACT
Objective To evaluate the clinical and radiological outcomes of skip-level anterior cervical discectomy and fusion(ACDF) for the treatment of two-level noncontiguous cervical spondylotic myelopathy(CSM).Methods There were 34 patients with two-level noncontiguous CSM underwent skip-level ACDF in our department from January 2014 to December 2016.The clinical outcome including surgery time, intraoperative blood loss,Japanese Orthopaedic Association(JOA) scores,Neck dysfunction index(NDI),the improvement rate of JOA,segment lordosis,fusion rate and Odom's criteria were evaluted.Results The surgery time was from 92 minutes to 125 minutes,mean operative time 103.28 minutes;the intraoperative blood loss was 50 to 150 mL,with average blood loss of 90 mL.The cervical spine lateral radiographs showed that the cervical physiological curvature had restored.The patients were followed up for average 6 months.The fusion rate of was 94.1％ at the lastest follow-up.No cages subside,implant failure or migration and infection occured.The JOA and NDI scores at the latest follow-up were(14.21±0.732) and (3.26±1.14),respectively,the JOA scores improvement rates was 58.62％.The segmental lordosis before surgery was(10.75±1.132)°,the one after surgery was(15.61±1.312)°,the difference was significant(P<0.05).The Odom's criteria at the lastest follow-up showed that excellent in 21 patients,good in 9 patients and fair in 4 patients,with excellent and good rate of 88.2％.Conclusion Skip-level ACDF can achieve good clinical and radiological outcomes including a high fusion rate and well maintainence of spinal curvature and intervertebral height for patients with two-level noncontiguous CSM.