SynthesisThe journal of spinal cord medicine2026
The time-dependent efficacy of early surgical decompression in patients with traumatic spinal cord injury: A systematic review and meta-analysis.
Synthesis in The journal of spinal cord medicine, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.
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Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed.
- Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation is associated with improved functional recovery and time-dependent changes in apoptosis-related execution-phase markers after spinal cord injury.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Surgical Timing After Spinal Cord Injury: A Narrative Review of Current Evidence and Perspectives.Korean journal of neurotrauma · 2025Review
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6 authors.
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Abstract
objectiveNumerous studies have demonstrated that early surgical intervention in patients with traumatic spinal cord injury leads to superior recovery of various indicators, including neurological function, compared to late surgical intervention. However, some relevant clinical randomized controlled trials have indicated that the motor function recovery of patients undergoing early surgical decompression does not show a significant advantage during initial follow-up periods. The benefits of early surgical decompression become more apparent as the follow-up duration extends. Therefore, this study aims to evaluate the prognosis of early versus late surgical intervention on traumatic spinal cord injury and to analyze whether the prognostic benefits of early surgical decompression in traumatic spinal cord injury patients are time-dependent.
methodsWe performed a systematic review and meta-analysis by searching the PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane Library databases for randomized controlled trials and quasi-randomized controlled trials that addressed the timing of surgical intervention for traumatic spinal cord injury. The data extracted from all included studies were processed and analyzed utilizing the RevMan 5.4 software.
resultsEight studies involving 702 patients were included in this analysis, with 345 patients in the early surgery group and 357 patients in the late surgery group. The results showed that the early surgery group had a significantly higher rate of improvement in AIS grade (OR = 1.50; 95% CI: 1.05-2.15;
conclusionEarly surgical decompression leads to better prognosis in patients with traumatic spinal cord injury and shows a trend of more obvious advantages in motor function recovery with longer follow-up time than late surgical intervention.
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