High-viscosity bone cement for vertebral compression fractures: a prospective study on intravertebral diffusion and leakage of bone cement

Background Bone cement leakage causes severe complication following percutaneous vertebroplasty. This study probed the diffusion and leakage status of bone cement injected within diverged time duration, so as to find the optimal injection time for bone cement. Methods A total of 70 patients with osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures with a symptom of low back pain, who underwent treatment at hospital were enrolled in this study. Patients were randomized into three groups: < 180 s, 180-300, and > 300 s of injection time duration from the beginning to the completion of the injection. The scenarios of vertebral bone cement leakage and diffusion were inspected using postoperative CT. Results The diffusion coefficient was higher in group A than in group B whereas it was higher in group B than in group C, but without statistical significance among the three groups. The leakage rate was without statistical significance among the three groups. The injection time of bone cement was negatively correlated with the diffusion coefficient, at the correlation coefficient of - 0.253. Conclusions The diffusion coefficient of high-viscosity bone cement is negatively correlated with the injection time, and the leakage rate of high-viscosity bone cement does not reduce with the prolongation of injection time.