Twenty-two patients with Scheuermann's kyphosis were treated with
correction, Harrington instrumentation (in twenty-one), and posterior spine
fusion. This procedure relieved pain and corrected deformity in all
patients but loss of correction of 5 degrees or more occurred in sixteen of
the twenty-two patients, including all those whose initial kyphosis was
greater than 70 degrees. The incidence of complications was so high that
this procedure should ordinarily be performed only for disabling pain or
spinal cord compression.