BACKGROUND:Percutaneous vertebroplasty for vertebral fractures can effectively relieve acute pain and has the advantages of smal trauma, good curative effect and less complications, but for patients with osteoporotic compression fractures, there were varying degrees of osteoporosis after surgery, which have a longer course of disease and cannot be easy to cure. So the effectiveness of percutaneous vertebroplasty cannot be ful y evaluated based on the pain relief. OBJECTIVE:To study the curative effect of percutaneous vertebroplasty for patients with fresh osteoporotic thoracolumbar vertebral compression fractures. METHODS:We selected 24 patients undergoing percutaneous vertebroplasty and 24 patients receiving conservative treatment at the same time who had fresh osteoporotic compression fractures as research objects;and compared pain degree, vertebral body height and the kyphosis Cobb angle, function activity of the lower lumbar before and after treatment, the quality of life and clinical incidence of complications within 6 months after treatment in the two groups. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION:The degree of pain, the vertebral body height, kyphosis Cobb angle, function activity of the lower lumbar were al improved in the two groups after treatment (P<0.05), and these indexes in the percutaneous vertebroplasty group were better than those in the conservative treatment group (P<0.05). The quality of life and incidence of complications within 6 months after treatment were improved better in the percutaneous vertebroplasty group than the conservative treatment group (both P<0.05). These results suggest that the percutaneous vertebroplasty for fresh osteoporotic thoracolumbar vertebral compression fractures can effectively reduce the pain of patients, improve vertebral deformity and activities of the lower lumbar, and has obvious role in promoting the postoperative quality of life of patients.