• Ishraq Joarder, Seika Taniguchi, Andrea Mendoza, and Mary Elizabeth Snow.
• Faculty of Medicine, University of British Columbia, #908 - 2233 Allison Road, Vancouver, BC, V6T 1T7, Canada. ishraq_j@hotmail.com.
• Eur Spine J. 2023 Apr 1; 32 (4): 120412441204-1244.

PurposeAdolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) is the most common type of scoliosis that affects children aged 10-18 years old, manifesting in a three-dimensional spinal deformity. This study aimed to explore outcome measures used in defining AIS treatment success. Particularly, analyzing the extent of qualitative and quantitative (radiographic and quality of life domains) measures to evaluate AIS and whether AIS treatment approaches (surgical, bracing and physiotherapy) influences outcomes used as proxies of treatment success.MethodsEMBASE and MEDLINE databases were used to conduct a systematic scoping review with 654 search queries. 158 papers met the inclusion criteria and were screened for data extraction. Extractable variables included: study characteristics, study participant characteristics, type of study, type of intervention approach and outcome measures.ResultsAll 158 studies measured quantitative outcomes. 61.38% of papers used radiographic outcomes whilst 38.62% of papers used quantitative quality of life outcomes to evaluate treatment success. Irrespective of treatment intervention utilized, the type of quantitative outcome measure recorded were similar in proportion. Moreover, of the radiographic outcome measures, the subcategory Cobb angle was predominantly used across all intervention approaches. For quantitative quality of life measures, questionnaires investigating multiple domains such as SRS were primarily used as proxies of AIS treatment success across all intervention approaches.ConclusionThis study identified that no articles employed qualitative measures of describing the psychosocial implications of AIS in defining treatment success. Although quantitative measures have merit in clinical diagnoses and management, there is increasing value in using qualitative methods such as thematic analysis in guiding clinicians to develop a biopsychosocial approach for patient care.© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.

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