The surfaces of annulus fibrosus tears are known harbingers of inflammatory constituents within intervertebral discs, stimulating sensitized nocioceptors within those tears. Other current treatment options of internal disc disruption neglect to specifically address the surface of these tears. Therefore, this investigation answers the question: does nonautologous fibrin sealant applied to the su...

OBJECTIVE Although the etiology of intervertebral disc degeneration is poorly understood, one possible approach for its regulation is apoptosis inhibition. This study was undertaken to investigate the antiapoptotic effects of caspase 3 in intervertebral disc degeneration in rabbits. METHODS We investigated the effects of caspase 3 small interfering RNA (siRNA) on rabbit nucleus pulposus cells...

A disc cyst is a rare entity with a clinical presentation that closely mimics an intervertebral disc herniation. Disc cysts are ventrally located, intraspinal, extradural cystic lesions that communicate with the parent intervertebral disc through a ruptured annulus. We present the clinical features, magnetic resonance imaging, intra-operative and histopathological findings of a variant of a lum...

When neck pain is associated with pain, numbness, or weakness in the arm, shoulder, or hand, further investigation is needed as these are symptoms indicating pressure on one or more nerve roots. Evaluation necessitates a neurologic examination and imaging using an MRI/CT scan. A degenerating disc loses some thickness and is less flexible, causing inter-vertebrae space to narrow. A radiologist d...

The avascular nature of the human intervertebral disc is thought to reduce the ability of resident disc cells to maintain their extracellular matrix, rendering the tissue susceptible to degeneration. It has also been suggested that the lack of a blood supply may result in disc cell death via nutrient deprivation. Therefore transplanting new cells into the disc to promote tissue regeneration wou...

BACKGROUND Loads acting on scoliotic spines are thought to be asymmetric and involved in progression of the scoliotic deformity; abnormal loading patterns lead to changes in bone and disc cell activity and hence to vertebral body and disc wedging. At present however there are no direct measurements of intradiscal stresses or pressures in scoliotic spines. The aim of this study was to obtain qua...

Percutaneous vertebroplasty (PVP) is popular for the treatment of intractable pain due to vertebral collapse from various lesions, intervertebral disk leakage of cement is a frequent complication. The aim of this study was to determine whether bone cement causes disc degeneration, and to evaluate the degree of intervertebral disc degeneration (IDD) according to the time period following cement ...

Back pain related to intervertebral disc degeneration is the most common musculoskeletal problem, with a lifetime prevalence of 82%. The lack of effective treatment for this widespread problem is directly related to our limited understanding of disc development, maintenance and degeneration. The aim of this study was to determine the developmental origins of nucleus pulposus cells within the in...

In a study on ten fresh human cadavers we examined the change in the height of the intervertebral disc space, the angle of lordosis and the geometry of the facet joints after insertion of intervertebral total disc replacements. SB III Charité prostheses were inserted at L3-4, L4-5, and L5-S1. The changes studied were measured using computer navigation software applied to CT scans before and aft...