Minimally Invasive Spine Surgery (MISS) in China.

Copy inimally Invasive Spine Surgery (MISS) has been potentially can be used in guiding instrumentation of every M defined by McAfee et al. (McAfee PC, 2010) as: ‘‘a procedure that by virtue of the extent and means of surgical techniques results in less collateral tissue damage, resulting in measurable decrease in morbidity and more rapid functional recovery than traditional exposures, without differentiation in the intended surgical goal’’. Increasingly, minimally invasive surgeries are desirable by both patients and surgeons. In the past few years various minimally invasive spinal surgeries have been developed for, and introduced into, the clinical setting. Procedures may involve one or more of the four ‘‘pillars’’ of MISS (Hartl, 2012), including microsurgical techniques, access strategies to the spine, imaging/navigation techniques, and specialized instruments and implants. The concepts and techniques of MISS have spread throughout China rapidly as a result of direct communication with surgeons worldwide. The first academic society on MISS was established in China in Oct. 2003. Four hundred surgeons participated in the first national meeting on MISS held in Dec. 2004 (YL Chi, 2005). Since then, increased numbers of orthopaedic and neurosurgeons have become interested in MISS. Training courses on special techniques, such as percutaneous vertebroplasty/kyphoplasty, percutaneous pedicle screw instrumentation, and percutaneous endoscopic lumbar discectomy, were held regularly in training centers, promoting the development of MISS in China. With nearly two decades of development, Chinese surgeons have developed MISS instruments and techniques while collecting an extensive amount of clinical data. This special issue includes eight original peer reviewed papers in this field authored by Chinese surgeons. Compared to MISS based on intra-operative radiographs, computer-assisted MISS (CAMISS), in which navigation plays an important role, is a great advance towards more precise and safer surgery. Prof. Wei Tian’s team has developed an universal navigation-based robot system which