Treatment results in spontaneous spinal epidural hematoma

Abstract

  Spontaneous spinal epidural hematoma (SSEH) is a rare disease that presents as an acute onset of myelopathy and back pain without any traumatic event. We retrospectively evaluated the clinical course and treatment outcomes of the cases at our hospital from 2008 to 2019. The average age of the patients (3 males and 9 females) was 70.3 years old (range: 55‒84 years). Ten cases with progressive neurological deterioration underwent emergent surgery the day of admission. The operation resulted in complete recovery in 7 cases, partial recovery in 2 cases, and no improvement in 1 case. The average onset to operation time was 7.8 hours (range: 4‒23 hours). The patients who experienced partial recovery and no improvement were the 3 oldest patients and they showed a wide range of hematomas involving an average of 6 vertebrae. We observed that early operation contributed to neurological improvement, a result that is consistent with previous reports. For SSEH patients, early diagnosis and operation leads to good treatment outcomes.