Spinal Elements, Inc. recently celebrated the two-year anniversary of its Hero Allograft program. The national “Pledge to Be a Hero” program offers surgeons and hospitals across the country the opportunity to pledge to use only allograft tissue from companies that do not profit from the transfer of that tissue whenever clinically feasible.
Spinal Elements Celebrates Hero Allograft Anniversary

The company indicates that by the end of 2014, approximately $600, 000 will have been raised from its Hero Allograft sales for children’s charities. The donations will be split between Make-A-Wish and the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee. The donations will be given in honor of Mike Leahy, M.D., Mirza Baig, M.D., and Douglas Musser, D.O., who all participate in Spinal Elements’ “Pledge to Be a Hero” program, and thus use the Hero Allograft exclusively.
Dr. Leahy told OTW, “Spinal Elements is the first spine company to donate 100 percent of the net proceeds from the sale of its new Hero tissue product to children’s charities. I share their vision of allograft tissue as the physical embodiment of human life deserving this level of respect. I am honored to be the first surgeon in Texas to be utilizing Hero and I hope my colleagues will join me.”

Discussion
This is a fascinating development. In my practice we've seen similar outcomes with the revised protocol. The key differentiator seems to be patient selection criteria. Has anyone else noticed the correlation with BMI thresholds?
Great point. I'd push back slightly on the conclusion, the sample size in the cited study is too small to draw population-level inferences. That said, the directional signal is compelling and worth a larger RCT.
We implemented a similar approach last year. Early results are promising but we're still gathering 12-month follow-up data. Happy to share our protocol if anyone is interested.
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