Abstract:[Objective] To compare the clinical efficacy of microscopy-assisted versus direct-vision decompression and instrumented fusion for lower cervical fracture and dislocation complicated with spinal cord injury. [Methods] From January 2016 to January 2018, 74 patients with lower cervical spine fracture and dislocation complicated with spinal cord injury were enrolled in this study. Of them, 40 pa- tients were treated with microscopic decompression and fusion fixation (the MS group), while the remaining 34 patients received convention- al direct-vision decompression and fusion fixation (the DV group). The perioperative period, follow-up and imaging data were compared be- tween the two groups. [Results] All patients in both groups had operation completed successfully. The MS group proved significantly superi- or to the DV group in terms of intraoperative blood loss, incision length, intraoperative fluoroscopy times, postoperative ambulation time and hospital stay (P<0.05), but the former consumed significantly longer operation time than the latter (P<0.05). In addition, the MS group had significantly lower incidence of early complications than the DV group (P<0.05). With time of follow-up lasted for (3.1±0.5) years, VAS and JOA scores, as well as Frankel index, improved significantly in both groups (P<0.05). However, there was no significant difference in the above items between the two groups at any corresponding time points (P>0.05), furthermore, there was no a significant difference in the time to resume full-weight bearing activity between the two groups (P>0.05). Radiographically, the ratio of anterior height of injured vertebrae significantly increased (P<0.05), whereas the local kyphotic Cobb angle significantly decreased in both groups at 3 months after operation and at the last follow-up compared with those preoperatively (P<0.05), which proved not statistically significant between the two groups at any corresponding time points (P>0.05). [Conclusion] Microscopy-assisted decompression and instrumented fusion for lower cervical frac- ture and dislocation accompanied with spinal cord injury have the advantages of less trauma and lower incidence of postoperative complica- tions.