[Principles of surgical technique of the anterior access to the thoraco-lumbar spine].

General surgeons are more and more frequently requested to prepare an operative exposure of the spine, in order to perform anterior maneuvers of removal and stabilization of the vertebral bodies. Since 1989 to date, in collaboration with the neurosurgical équipe of Prof. G. Cantore, Neurological Sciences Department, La Sapienza University of Rome, the Authors have collected 116 cases of vertebral diseases: among them, 48 involved the thoraco-lumbar junction of the spine (D12-L2). In this paper, Authors' aim is to state precisely the surgical technique of the anterior access to the thoraco-lumbar junction: attention has been focused on this tract of the column stating its anatomical complexity and the high invasivity of the procedures requested for its exposure. Therefore, such notes of technique have been elaborated to make safer the neurosurgical demolitive and reconstructive procedures and, most of all, to reduce the surgical trauma whenever it is possible.