Quality of Life in Patients Before and After Surgery For a Lumbar Spinal Stenosis

Abstract

Background: To study the quality of life (QoL) outcomes in patients with lumbar spinal stenosis (LSS).

Materials and Methods: Patients that had undergone surgery for LSS entered into this cross sectional study. Demographics, duration of symptoms, walking distance and grading stenosis based on MRI were determined. Pre-operative and 6-month and 1- and 2 -year post-operative QoL outcomes by using a Japanese Orthopedic Association Back Pain Evaluation Questionnaire (JOABPEQ), Short Form-36 scores (SF-36)  questionnaire and visual analogue scale (VAS) for pain in 142 patients were analyzed.

Results: Median age of the patients was 59.9 ± 10.1 years. 40.1% were men. All of patients were grades C (n = 101) and D (n=41). Median follow-up time was 2.9± 0.9 years. There was significant reduction in the severity of back pain (VAS, p < 0.05) at 6-month and 1- and 2 -year. There was significant improvement in all aspects of the Quality of Life (JOABPEQ and SF-36, p < 0.05) scores except for general health subscale of SF-36 at 6-month and 1- and 2 -year post- operation.

Conclusions: The findings suggest that surgery procedure offers significant and valuable improvement in QoL outcomes for the LSS patients.

 Keywords: Quality of life, JOABPEQ, grading stenosis, SF-36, surgery