Baseline patient demographics.a
| Characteristics | MLCF (n = 562) | UCF (n = 281) | P |
| Age, y, mean (SD) | 53.7 (10.8) | 58.3 (9.4) | <0.0001 |
| BMI, kg/m2, mean (SD) | 30.3 (7.3) | 29.3 (6.8) | 0.063 |
| Sex, % (n) | <0.0001 | ||
| Woman | 53.0 (298) | 29.2 (82) | |
| Man | 47.0 (264) | 70.8 (199) | |
| Race, % (n) | <0.0001 | ||
| Black or African American | 35.6 (200) | 56.9 (160) | |
| White or Caucasian | 60.9 (342) | 39.5 (111) | |
| Other | 3.0 (17) | 2.5 (7) | |
| Not available | 0.5 (3) | 1.1 (3) | |
| Insurance, % (n) | 0.005 | ||
| Medicaid | 27.2 (153) | 18.9 (53) | |
| Medicare | 32.4 (182) | 44.5 (125) | |
| Self-pay | 20.8 (117) | 16.7 (47) | |
| Private | 12.3 (69) | 11.7 (33) | |
| Other | 7.3 (41) | 8.2 (23) | |
| Married or with partner, % (n) | 39.2 (220) | 41.3 (115) | 0.786 |
| Psychiatric diagnosis, % (n) | |||
| Anxiety | 36.7 (206) | 27.8 (78) | 0.014 |
| Depression | 33.3 (187) | 23.8 (67) | 0.005 |
| Psychotic | 2.7 (15) | 2.5 (7) | 0.879 |
Abbreviations: ACDF, anterior cervical discectomy and fusion; BMI, body mass index; MLCF, middle-to-lower cervical fusion; UCF, upper cervical fusion.
Note: Boldface indicates statistically significant comparison.
↵a Patients were classified as UCF or MLCF based on the inclusion of C3 to C4 level in the ACDF construct.