Implementing an infection control checklist May not be effective in reducing the incidence of surgical site infections in spinal surgery.

A failure in decreasing the SSI rate through the implementation of a SSI prevention checklist may be due to several factors pertaining to the study design, patient characteristics and the Gr (-) dominance in SSIs in our center. Nevertheless, this suggests that checklist implementation to prevent SSI in instrumented spine surgery may not be effective in all contexts.