Clinical Profile and Outcome of Surgical Management of Spinal Tumours in Abuja

Background: Spinal tumours may originate from the native tissues of the spine, spinal cord, or secondary to metastatic spread. Their neurological manifestations are often similar, irrespective of origin. Surgical intervention may be curative in most benign tumours and palliative in metastatic spine tumours. Improvement in the surgical management of spine tumours has resulted in better patients’ health-related quality of life. There have been only few reports on surgical management of spinal tumours in Nigeria. Objective: The study aimed to retrospectively evaluate the clinical aspects and short-term outcome of surgically managed patients with spine tumours in our institution over 3 years. Materials and Methods: A retrospective review of patients treated surgically for spinal tumours at the Neurosurgery Department of National Hospital Abuja between June 2021 and November 2024. Results: Thirty-four patients with histologically proven spinal tumours who had surgeries were reviewed. There was a slight female preponderance with mean age of 51 years. Back pain and motor deficits were the most common presentation. Metastatic tumours from prostates and the breast were the commonest operated cases. The thoracic spine was most frequently affected (50%), followed by the cervical spine (20.6%). Gross total resection was achieved for all meningioma and schwannoma cases. Most metastatic tumours were debulked to decompress the spinal cord. Half of the patients improved, 30% remained same and 20% deteriorated as at last follow up. Conclusion: Surgical intervention results in significant improvement of pain and neurological deficit in most of the patients with spinal tumours. Metastatic spinal tumours were the most operated cases.