Evaluation of Outcomes for Quality of Life and Activities of Daily Living for BKP in the Treatment of VCFs

Inclusion criteria

• ✓. Identified as an appropriate candidate for BKP and should have made the choice to have the procedure.
• ✓. Must be Medicare Eligible (At least 65 years of age or otherwise eligible).
• ✓. Must have one to three target VCFs, located between T5 and L5, which are due to underlying primary or secondary osteoporosis or cancer.
• ✓. Cancer patients should not have had a change in chemotherapy regimen within the last month, nor should they have a planned change within the next month from time of enrollment, with the exception of changes in dose.
• ✓. All VCFs to be treated must have clinical pain symptoms (pain on palpation/percussion over the fractured vertebral body) that correlate with radiographic findings as follows:
• ✓. Height change: An acute (≤ four month) change in VB height or morphology from a previous x-ray, CT or MRI, with height loss at the anterior, middle or posterior portion of the VB consistent with a worsening of one or more grades by the Genant criteria20, OR
• ✓. Positive MRI or bone scan: VB shows hyperintense signal on STIR sequence MRI, or target VB is positive on radionuclide bone scan.
• ✓. All VCFs to be treated must have an estimated fracture age of four months or less.