ArticleSpine2020
Patient Reported Outcomes in Patients Who Stop Following Up: Are They Doing Better or Worse Than the Patients That Come Back?
Article in Spine, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 25 citations in OpenAlex.
- Cumulative surgeon volume is associated with improved outcomes following hip arthroscopy: A national registry study.Knee surgery, sports traumatology, arthroscopy : official journal of the ESSKA · 2026Article
- Factors Influencing Follow-up Attendance and Its Effect on Functional Outcomes in Middle-Aged and Geriatric Hip Fracture Patients.Journal of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons. Global research & reviews · 2025Article
- The effectiveness of cervical medial branch radiofrequency neurotomy using a perpendicular approach with a three-tined probe: A single-arm, retrospective cohort study.Interventional pain medicine · 2025Article
- Analysis of factors associated with patient-reported outcome (PRO) score completion rate one year after shoulder surgeries.JSES international · 2024Article
- Poor patient-reported mental health correlates with inferior patient-reported outcome measures following cervical disc replacement.Acta neurochirurgica · 2023Article
- Postoperative clinical outcomes in patients undergoing MIS-TLIF versus LLIF for adjacent segment disease.Acta neurochirurgica · 2023Article
- Practical answers to frequently asked questions in minimally invasive lumbar spine surgery.The spine journal : official journal of the North American Spine Society · 2023Review
- A Narrative Literature Review of Bias in Collecting Patient Reported Outcomes Measures (PROMs).International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
STUDY
designFollow-up study.
objectiveTo determine whether minimally invasive lumbar spine surgery outcomes are different between those who are lost to follow-up and those who are not. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA: Lost to follow-up patients are a common source of selection bias for clinical outcomes research. Currently, there are no US based studies that evaluate the differences in outcomes of lost to follow-up patients after spine surgeries.
methodsA retrospective review of prospectively collected data of 289 patients who underwent minimally invasive lumbar surgery and were at least 1 year postsurgery was performed. Patients were divided into two groups: (1) lost to follow-up (LTF), defined as patients who had missed more than two consecutive follow-up visits and had not attended their 1-year follow-up appointment; and (2) not lost to follow-up. For the not-LTF cohort, patient response outcome measures (PROMs) (oswestry disability index (ODI), visual analog scale (VAS) back/leg, Short Form-12 (SF-12) Physical/Mental, PROMIS) and return to activities data were collected prospectively at each follow-up. For LTF patients, data were collected through emailed surveys or telephone interviews. PROMs and return to activities data of the two groups were compared. Sub-group analysis by type of surgery (decompression or fusion) was also performed.
resultsFor the entire cohort, independent t test analysis showed LTF patients had greater improvement in PROMIS Physical Function scores than those who were not-LTF (15.08 vs. 10.38, P = 0.026). For fusion surgeries, LTF patients showed a greater improvement in ODI (-30.94 vs. -16.23, P = 0.003) VAS back (-4.92 vs. -2.99, P = 0.044), and PROMIS-PF (16.09 vs. 10.38, P = 0.049). There were no significant differences in complication rates between LTF and not LTF patients.
conclusionPatients undergoing minimally invasive lumbar surgery-in particular lumbar fusions-who are lost to follow-up and responded to subsequent email and phone interviews showed greater improvements in self-reported outcomes than those who continued to follow-up. Thus, our results suggest that a substantial subset of patients who are lost to follow-up do not fare worse than those who do follow-up. However, an opposite response cannot be excluded in those who did not respond to email and phone interviews. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: 3.
Indexed as
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.