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In patients who undergo vertebral fusion during surgery for a herniated intervertebral disk, adjacent segments often undergo accelerated degeneration after the procedure. Chinese orthopedists report on the first five transplants of cadaveric intervertebral disks in humans.
Thirteen healthy intervertebral disks, along with thin slices of the adjacent vertebral endplates, were harvested from three young women who died from trauma; specimens were stored in liquid nitrogen. Five patients (age range, 41 to 56) were recruited: four with degenerative cervical disk disease causing symptomatic myelopathy, and one with incomplete paraplegia from traumatic cervical disk herniation. Each patient underwent a near-total excision of a single intervertebral…