Patients suffering from cervical spondylotic radiculopathy or myelopathy who were treated conservatively in our clinic were subjected in order to determine the prognosis of this disease. Twenty-seven cases were followed up for a year to 15 years (avelage: 6 years 11 months in radiculopathy, 6 years 9 months in myelopathy).
The results were as follows.
1) Radiculopathy (18 cases):
Subjective symptoms of 14 patients had improved and 8 patients (45%) of them had completely releaved.
2) Myelopathy (9 cases):
Most of the cases especially in type III myelopathy of our classification had become progressively worse at the time of the follow-up study.
The results suggested that the conservative treatment were effective in radiculopathy except progressively deteriorating cases and most of the cases with myelopathy especially in type III should be treated surgically as early as possible.
