Bone source in some lumbar fusion procedures

[fredf]

In lumbar spine fusion, such as L4/L5, many Drs pack bone between the spinous processes on either side to form a bridge between vertebrae. The bone can come from the patient's hip or from a mixture of precursor bone. Can anyone say what they use for the precursor bone material? The advantage of using it instead of hip bone is that the hip is not subjected to trauma. Which approach is best (i.e. patients bone or outside source) and the trade-offs? Anyone know of other threads or reference links on this? Thanks.

Fred, mmglobal here. Your post (below) was made in the Abstracts and Articles forum. Since it is essentially the same question you posted above, and because it is not an abstract or article; I merged the 2 threads into one, here in the main (iSpine) forum. I hoep you don't mind. Mark

Originally Posted by fredf

I would like to find out what Drs use as bone precursor material in procedures where they make a bone bridge between spinous processes in L4/L5 lumbar spine fusion. What is the trade-off between this and using bone from the patient's hip? I know it avoids trauma to the hip but is it as good? of better? Thanks.

[mmglobal]

I've spoken to many lumbar fusion patients who complain that "the new hip pain at the harvest site is worse than my old back pain". I have also spoken to many surgeons who firmly believe that the best fusion rate will be accomplished with autograft. (autograft is harvested from YOU, were allograft comes from a donor. (they don't need it anymore.)

There are many products designed to improve fusion options. Some are as simple as developing a usable synthetic bone graft material, or a sophisticated as Bone Morphogenic Protein (BMP). These new products are expensive. Many surgeons are early adopters of these new technologirs, while others are uncomfortable with the unknowns of the new products. The skeptical ones have seen too many examples of seemingly wonderful technology that turns out to be a horror.j

[karreymetris]

Don't mean to hijack, but what exactly is a fusion? I have heard bad things about it, and am not sure it is for me, though I definitely need surgery.