How are patients influenced when counseled for minimally invasive lumbar spine surgeries? A stepwise model assessing pivotal information for decision-making

Outpatient Posterior Lumbar Fusion

“…With the increasing emphasis on value-based care and cost efficiency in this healthcare environment, surgeons and healthcare administrators are showing increasing interest in outpatient spine surgery as a realistic means for minimizing costs and burden associated with lengthy postoperative hospital courses and increasing satisfaction in an appropriately selected patient population. 11 This has primarily been in the form of outpatient lumbar discectomies, laminotomies, foraminotomies, anterior cervical discectomy and fusion, cervical disc arthroplasty, and cement augmentation procedures. 2,7,12,13 Over the past decade, minimally invasive techniques using tubular and other specialized retractors facilitated the emergence of PLF (TLIF, PLIF) in the outpatient setting through blunt dissection between muscle fibers, percutaneous pedicle screw placement, and indirect visualization using image guidance.…”

Consent for spine surgery: an observational study

“…10,11 There is a paucity of research on 'real-life' objective data in observed clinical practice of the surgeon-patient risk-benefit discussion during the informed consent process for spine surgery and there is little analysis of where the pitfalls in communication may lie. [12][13][14][15][16][17][18] The aims of this study were to directly observe and analyse spine surgeons obtaining 'informed consent' for non-instrumented spine surgery using video recording to gain a real-world view of the process and identify potential areas for improvement to guide future practice and research in this context.…”