Endoscopic transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion: Technical note

Abstract

With recent advanced tools in hands, spine surgery is leaping towards the whole new era, conventional open spine surgeries are being replaced by the minimally invasive endoscopic spine procedures. With evolution of endoscopy, long list of objectives is possible to achieve like minimize the trauma of surgery and the reductions of surgical blood loss, hospital stay, and complication rates. Traditional open lumbar fusion surgery and in last decade minimally invasive transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion (MIS-TLIF) have become the standard treatment for the lumbar spine disorders. However, MIS-TLIF techniques still require an access through musculature for tube placement with considerable trauma to the musculature and bone resection. Thus, MIS-TLIF represents an incremental but not revolutionary advancement over the existing open surgical methods. With endoscopy-assisted transforaminal/transkambian Interbody fusion with MIS spine fixation provides a better and minimally invasive way of TLIF. In this article, we will discuss the technique of Endo TLIF, pearls, and pitfalls.