gms | German Medical Science

65th Annual Meeting of the German Society of Neurosurgery (DGNC)

German Society of Neurosurgery (DGNC)

11 - 14 May 2014, Dresden

Article

Send article

Timing of cranioplasty after decompressive craniectomy in pediatric patients regarding postoperative complications – a single center series

Meeting Abstract

Search Medline for

  • Patrick Schuss - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
  • Valeri Borger - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
  • Ági Oszvald - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
  • Hartmut Vatter - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn
  • Erdem Güresir - Klinik für Neurochirurgie, Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn

Deutsche Gesellschaft für Neurochirurgie. 65. Jahrestagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Neurochirurgie (DGNC). Dresden, 11.-14.05.2014. Düsseldorf: German Medical Science GMS Publishing House; 2014. DocMI.04.04

doi: 10.3205/14dgnc292, urn:nbn:de:0183-14dgnc2921

Published: May 13, 2014

© 2014 Schuss et al.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/deed.en). You are free: to Share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work, provided the original author and source are credited.

Outline

Text

Objective: Decompressive craniectomy (DC) for intractable intracranial pressure mandates later cranioplasty (CP). Despite possible residual brain swelling after DC, several previous reports suggested an early performed CP in terms of better neurological outcome. However, the timing of CP after DC remains still controversial and data on CP in pediatric patients is scarce. We therefore analyzed pediatric patients with CP after DC concerning timing of CP and associated postoperative complications.

Method: From 2002 to 2013, CP was performed in 24 pediatric patients (age 0–18 years). Patients were divided into two groups according to the time to cranioplasty (“early” <6 weeks versus “late” >6 weeks). Patient characteristics, timing of CP, and CP related postoperative complications were analyzed. Postoperative complications were defined as complications that occurred within 4 weeks after the procedure.

Results: Overall CP was performed early in 25% vs. late in 75%. The overall postoperative complication rate was 16.6%. Patients who underwent CP early after DC suffered significantly more often from complications compared to patients who underwent CP late after initial DC (p=0.04).

Conclusions: We provide detailed data on surgical timing and complication for cranioplasty after DC in pediatric patients. The present data suggest that children with CP performed more than 6 weeks after DC might benefit from a lower complication rate.