Back pain is becoming a more frequent reason why doctors examine patients. The most common causes of spine disease include degeneration of the inter-vertebral discs, trauma and deformity such as scoliosis and tumors. For patients where conservative treatment has failed, a range of surgical procedures of

 Spinal Fixation System

are available to treat their conditions.

The most renowned treatments for back pain are the fusion method and the golden standard method. However, fusion causes excessive loading on the adjacent segments, which leads to degenerative changes within a few years. Also, fractures often occur on the screws and rods because too much stress is inflicted on the rigid implants, thereby reducing the efficiency of fusion and increasing back pain. The evolution of new procedure and products has been driven by the need to find less invasive and long lasting solutions to spine problems, which preserve the natural anatomy and maintain spine mobility. Out of the many,

Dynamic Stabilization System

have caught the interest of researchers and surgeons for the past few years.

However, the indication of dynamic stabilization system is very limited, owing to the strict condition in order to expect the successful clinical outcome. That is, dynamic stabilization devices certainly need the function of intervertebral disc similar to the normal. In paticular, since degeneration of spinal column mainly begins at the anterior part(intervertebral disc), spine surgeons have a difficulty in finding the patients suitable to dynamic stabilization device. If they use only dynamic stabilization device without the help of interbody fusion cage on patients undergoing both anterior and posterior instability, they encounter implant failure such as rod fracture. As a result, the main trend of treatment is "Semirigid fixation approach" that interbody fusion cage brings about the stabilization of anterior part and posterior dynamic stabilization device gives rise to the stabilization of posterior part.

The Bioflex Spring Rod System is not only a kind of

Pedicle Screw System

which consists of Titanium screws and Nitinol rods but also a kind of innovative

Spinal Fixation System

which can be applied to

Dynamic Stabilization System

and

Semirigid Fixation System

altogether. Since this system utilizes the super-elastic properties of Nitinol(Shape Memory Alloy) Spring rod, and the high level of durability of Titanium respectively, it is a kind of

Nitinol Spring Rod System

. The strengths of the rod shapes combined with the material properties allow Bioflex to convert abnormal motion segments into physiologic movement segments, preventing degenerative changes in the adjacent segments, and reducing instrument failures. The screw head has a design-specific advantage; it has two grooves, each of which is insertion spaces for the rods, allowing multilevel fixations and extension of the whole system in case of operation on other segments. This makes the system connectable, and due to the 3-D flexibility of the rods, natural lordosis is possible without bending the rods during the surgery.

In conclusion, the BioFlex Spring Rod System is a new and advanced technology in the Spinal Fixation System, an innovation for the Semirigid Fixation System and Dynamic Stabilization Systems in the spine market.