Parents’ and Patients’ Perceptions of Postoperative Appearance in Adolescent Idiopathic Scoliosis

Abstract

Radiographic and physical measures of deformity do not correlate well with patients' and parents' perceptions of appearance. Patients and parents do not strongly agree on the cosmetic outcome of AIS surgery. Therefore, given that the adolescents themselves undergo the surgery, patients' assessments of their deformity, rather than radiographic measures or parents' assessments, should play a major role in the evaluation of surgical success.