You are here

Article Text

Article menu
Download PDFPDF
Novel treatment (new drug/intervention; established drug/procedure in new situation)
CASE REPORT
Symptomatic dyspnoea addressed by excision of ossified anterior longitudinal ligament
  1. Nishant Kumar1,
  2. Ravish Shammi Patel1,
  3. Mark Kim Thye Thong2,
  4. Naresh Kumar1
  1. 1Department of Orthopedic Surgery, National University Hospital, Singapore
  2. 2Department of Otorhinolaryngology, National University Hospital, Singapore
  1. Correspondence to Dr Naresh Kumar, dosksn{at}nus.edu.sg

Summary

Ossification of the anterior longitudinal ligament (OALL) in cervical spine is known to cause dysphagia. However, dyspnoea and obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) due to OALL is a rare entity. A 50-year-old man presented to our clinic 2 years after anterior cervical discectomy and fusion (ACDF) with complaints of dysphagia, dyspnoea and difficulty in sleeping supine. The clinico-neurological examination of patient was normal without any long tract signs. The diagnosis of OALL was made on plain lateral radiographs. Ultrasonic bone cutter was used to convert sessile osteophyte mass into a pedunculated mass. It was then disconnected from the anterior aspect of vertebral bodies with a chisel. The patient showed immediate relief from dysphagia and OSA. Dyspnoea improved over a week and the postoperative change in voice responded well to speech therapy. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of dyspnoea due to OALL after ACDF.

  • ear, nose and throat/otolaryngology
  • spinal cord
  • sleep disorders (respiratory medicine)
  • orthopaedic and trauma surgery
  • neurosurgery

https://doi.org/10.1136/bcr-2017-223322

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    View Full Text

    Footnotes

    • Contributors NK and RSP have contributed equally in preparing the manuscript, acquisition of data, analysis, reporting and revising the manuscript. Both of them should be regarded as co-first authors. NSK has played significant role in the conception and design of the work, assisted in preparing the manuscript and critically reviewed the draft version. MKTT played an important role in conceptualisation, proofreading of the draft, critically revising the intellectual content and assisted in completing the manuscript. All authors approved the final version of the manuscript. All authors have contributed significantly for planning, conduct and reporting of the work described in the article.

    • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Patient consent Obtained.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.