Postoperative posterior lumbar muscle changes and their relationship to segmental motion preservation or restriction: a randomized prospective study

Abstract

Motion restriction via stand-alone ALIF and motion preservation via TDR both present small changes in the posterior lumbar paraspinal muscles with regard to volume atrophy or fatty degeneration at the index and superior adjacent segments. Therefore, although the clinical outcome was not affected by the observed muscular changes, the authors concluded that the expected negative influence of motion restriction on the posterior muscles compared with motion preservation does not occur on a clinically relevant level.