Optimal caudal needle angulation for lumbar medial branch denervation: A 3D cadaveric and clinical imaging comparison study.

Background: Lumbar medial branch (MB) radiofrequency ablation is a common intervention to treat facetogenic low back pain. The consensus among spine pain interventionalists is that capturing a greater length of the MB correlates with a longer duration of pain relief. Therefore, there has been interest in defining optimal needle angles to achieve parallel cannula placement.

Pharmacodynamic effects following co-administration of cannabinoids and opioids: a scoping review of human experimental studies.

Background: Cannabinoids are increasingly used in the management of chronic pain. Although analgesic potential has been demonstrated, cannabinoids interact with a range of bodily functions that are also influenced by chronic pain medications, including opioids.

Objective: We performed a scoping review of literature on the pharmacodynamic effects following the co-administration of cannabinoids and opioids.

Efficacy of perioperative pharmacological and regional pain interventions in adult spine surgery: a network meta-analysis and systematic review of randomised controlled trials.

Background: Development of a widely accepted standardised analgesic pathway for adult spine surgery has been hampered by the lack of quantitative analysis. We conducted a systematic review and network meta-analysis (NMA) to compare, rank, and grade all pharmacological and regional interventions used in adult spine surgery.

Methods: A systematic search was performed in January 2021.

Automatic segmentation of the carotid artery and internal jugular vein from 2D ultrasound images for 3D vascular reconstruction.

Purpose: In the context of analyzing neck vascular morphology, this work formulates and compares Mask R-CNN and U-Net-based algorithms to automatically segment the carotid artery (CA) and internal jugular vein (IJV) from transverse neck ultrasound (US).

Methods: US scans of the neck vasculature were collected to produce a dataset of 2439 images and their respective manual segmentations. Fourfold cross-validation was employed to train and evaluate Mask RCNN and U-Net models.

Anesthetic management of complex spine surgery in adult patients: a review based on outcome evidence.

Purpose Of Review: The aim of this article is to review the evidence regarding the anesthetic management of blood loss, pain control, and position-related complications of adult patients undergoing complex spine procedures.

Recent Findings: The most recent evidence of the anesthetic management of complex spine surgery was identified with a systematic search and graded. In our review, prophylactic tranexamic acid and optimal prone positioning were shown to be effective blood conservation strategies with minimal risks to the patients.