Diagnosis and management of juxtafacet cysts

Abstract

<jats:p>✓ Juxtafacet cysts are lesions that are associated with spinal facet joints. Although these lesions are frequently noted as incidental findings on imaging studies of the spine, they may produce symptoms in some patients. Juxtafacet cysts can mimic herniated discs, resulting in symptoms from focal nerve root and/or spinal cord compression. Some of these lesions are associated with spinal instability, and patients may require spinal fusion to address this underlying disorder. Conservative therapy for symptomatic lesions is often unsuccessful, although there are reports of spontaneous resolution of these cysts as well as the symptoms associated with them. Surgical therapy should be focused on decompression of the lesions causing nerve root compression and the accompanying symptoms, while recognizing that instability requiring fusion may be present in some but not all cases.</jats:p>

Histopathological Findings of Hemorrhagic Ganglion Cyst Causing Acute Radicular Pain: A Case Report

“…Some surgeons prefer simple removal of cyst and others recommend instrumentation and fusion2,17). Many articles report that the juxtafacet cyst has inherent segmental instability4,5,13,14,17). Niggemann et al reported high rate of vertebral slip and angular movement in the affected segment14).…”

Pigmented villonodular synovitis originating from the lumbar facet joint: a case report

“…In recent years, research has suggested that deoxyribonucletic acid ploidy status and proliferative index might be related to the potential for recurrence [6]. There have been no reports focused strictly on the value of various surgical procedures (some authors recommend wide synovectomy and/or laminectomy), although it is important to totally remove the synovium in order to prevent the recurrence [5]. In our case, a total synovectomy with a unilateral osteoplastic laminectomy was performed.…”

“…The occurrence of PVNS in the axial skeleton is quite rare and there have been few reports of PVNS of the lumbar spine; specifically, only 18 cases are found in the English literature [4,7,8,10,16,21,23,24,26,27,30,31]. There have been no reports focusing on surgical treatment for PVNS although it is important that the synovium is totally removed to prevent the recurrence [5]. We successfully treated a case of PVNS that originated from the lumbar facet joint (L4-5) using total synovectomy with unilateral osteoplastic laminectomy.…”

Degenerative Disease

“…Although juxtafacet cysts may occur throughout the spine they occur most frequently in the lumbar spine [43] and some consider the occurrence associated with spinal instability and/or spondylolisthesis.…”