Bone Density readings in already fused segments?

[mmglobal]

Greetings from Nijmegen, Holland! I'm about 1/2 way through an amazing trip with some quite incredible surgeries and happenings along the way. I'll try to post more later. I just want to throw some info out there because I found it quite interesting.

One of my clients has a long scoliosis fusion from high thoracic to mid lumbar regions. Prior to surgery, a bone density test was done and my heart sank whan I saw the readings and average t-score that indicated severe osteoporosis.

Further discussions with the surgeons revealed that while her t-score indicates severe osteoporosis, she may not be osteoporotic at all. She had harrington rods that spanned the fused segments for 15 years. In the 2 years since the rods were removed, she's been substantially disabled, so her activity levels have been extremely low and she's spent much of the time bedridden.

In the 15 years following the fusion, the spine was substantially off-loaded by the harrington rods. It is considered that she is not really osteoporotic, she has localized bone density issues where the harrington rods relieved the loading... this reduced bone density is a natural and expected side-effect of her configuration. Fortunately it did not represent a challenge for the surgery... I hope to post details of this major recontstruction later.

Mark