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Pandora,
difficult question......the 2 options are operative stabilization and non-operative therapy. Each neurosurgeon will have criteria they use to decide which way to go, including the potential for (structural) instability, cord injury, ligament damage, activity level of the patient just to name a few. In terms of structural integrity, not to get you in over your head, there are 3 columns of the spine and depending on which of them, if any, have loss of stability, may dictate the need for operation.
The human body, if not overly smashed, can and will heal. If he just has compression fractures and no retropulsion (bone pushed into the cord), non-operative treatment may be okay.....it may not in the long run if he compresses, shifts, losses structural integrity in the future....it is a dynamic answer for a dynamic situation...it changes and there is no one way to deal with it....best to get 2 opinions from 2 different neurosurgeons that specialize in spine injuries.
ss
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'Revel in action, translate perceptions into instant judgements, and these into actions that are irrevocable, monumentous and dreadful - all this with lightning speed, in conditions of great stress and in an environment of high tension:what is expected of "us" is the impossible, yet we deliver just that.
(adapted from: Sherwin B. Nuland, MD, surgeon and author: The Wisdom of the Body, 1997 )
Education is the anti-ignorance we all need to better treat our patients. ss, 2008.
The blade is so sharp that the incision is perfect. They don't realize they've been cut until they're out of the fight: A Surgeon Warrior. I use a knife to defend life and to save it. ss (aka traumadoc)
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