Pedicle Screw Placement in Adolescent Idiopathic Scoliosis: A Comparison between Robotics Coupled with Navigation versus the Freehand Technique

(1) Background: Robotics coupled with navigation (RAN) is a modern surgical platform shown to increase screw placement accuracy during pediatric scoliosis surgery. Our institution uses a technique which combines the RAN platform for apical pedicle screw placement and the freehand (FH) technique for terminal pedicle screw placement during scoliosis surgery (termed hybrid technique). We question if the complementary use of the RAN technology affects intraoperative outcomes, relative to the FH-only approach. (2) Methods: 60 adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) patients, ages 11-19 at surgery, who were operated on from 2019 through 2020 by a single surgeon, were retrospectively reviewed. Patients were separated by surgery type (hybrid RAN or FH), matched on demographic and surgical factors, and their intraoperative outcomes were compared statistically. (3) Results: Hybrid RAN patients had more screws placed (p = 0.01) and were of a higher BMI percentile (p = 0.005). Controlling for the number of screws placed, BMI%, and initial curve magnitude, there were no statistical differences in estimated blood loss per screw (p = 0.51), curve correction (p = 0.69), complications (p = 0.52), or fluoroscopy time (p = 0.88), between groups. However, operative time was two minutes longer per screw for hybrid RAN patients (p < 0.001). (4) Conclusions: Hybrid RAN surgeries took longer than FH, but yielded comparable effectiveness and safety as the FH technique during the initial RAN adoption phase.