Demographic pattern, clinical profile and outcome of traumatic spinal cord injuries at a tertiary care hospital

Background: Spinal cord injury represents one of the most physically and psychologically devastating trauma. Before modern medicine, it was considered an ailment not to be treated. In incomplete spinal cord injury (SCI), there is residual sensory and/or motor function. Method: This was to determine the epidemiology, treatment options and outcome of incomplete SCI at National Orthopedic Hospital Enugu, Nigeria, over a 5 year period. This was a descriptive retrospective study of patients managed for incomplete spinal cord injury between January 2011 and December 2015. This was to determine the epidemiology, various treatment options and their outcome in patients with incomplete SCI managed in our center. The patients' biodata, mechanism of injury, time of presentation, pattern of injury, level of injury, type of treatment, associated injuries, complications, duration of treatment and American Spinal Injury Association (ASIA) assessment at presentation and at discharge were collected. Data analysis was done using statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) version 20.0. All tests were regarded as significant at P-values < 0.05. Results: A total of 57 patients (49 males and 8 females) were included and analyzed showing a male to female ratio of 6.3:1. Incomplete traumatic SCI forms about 44.2% of all traumatic SCI in Enugu. This represents 0.09% of all patients and 0.9% of all trauma patients seen. The cervical spine (59.6%) is the most commonly affected isolated anatomic region. Road traffic accident (52.6%) was the most common aeteology. Compression fracture was the commonest injury (33.3%). Majority of the patients (57.9%) had ASIA C at presentation while 47.4% and 33.3% of the patients had ASIA D and E respectively at discharge. Most of the patients (91.2%) had conservative treatments. Conclusion: The significant ASIA grade improvement of majority of the patients suggests good functional outcome of incomplete SCI treated conservatively at our hospital.

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Spinal Cord Injury Prevalence and Treatment Modalities

Ara¹,

Singh²,

Raj³

et al. 2023

Spinal Cord Injury - Current Trends in Acute Management, Function Preservation and Rehabilitation Protocols

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Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a devasting neurological condition producing physical dependency, morbidity, psychological stress, and financial burden. During the last 30 years, its global prevalence has increased from 236 to 1298 cases per million populations. Two types of spinal cord injury are primary and secondary injury. Primary injury is mechanical damage to the cord itself whereas secondary injury results from one or more biochemical and cellular processes that are triggered by the primary lesion. In 1700 BC, in an Egyptian surgical papyrus, they describe the frustration of health care professionals in treating a severe spinal cord injury, the Papyrus reported spinal fractures as a “disease that should not be treated”. Most of these studies approach a patient with acute spinal cord injury (ASCI) in one of four manners: corrective surgery or a physical, biological, or pharmacological treatment method. Science is unraveling the mechanisms of cell protection and neuroregeneration, but clinically, we only provide supportive care for patients with spinal cord injuries. By combining these treatments, researchers attempt to enhance the functional recovery of patients with spinal cord injuries. Advances in the last decade have allowed us to encourage the development of experimental studies in the field of spinal cord regeneration. The combination of several therapeutic strategies should, at a minimum, allow for partial functional recoveries for these patients, which could improve their quality of life. More studies were done on spinalized animals that indicate that most of these pharmacological agents may act on receptors present in the spinal cord, thus facilitate to produce coordinated locomotor movement, whereas some other drugs used to improve the neuropathological changes caused because of spinal cord injury (SCI), such as spasticity or demyelination, to improve walking.

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Demographic pattern, clinical profile and outcome of traumatic spinal cord injuries at a tertiary care hospital

Cited by 4 publications

References 6 publications

A hospital based cross-sectional study on clinical profile of patients with spinal cord injuries

A hospital based cross-sectional study on clinical profile of patients with spinal cord injuries

Incomplete Spinal Cord Injury in Enugu, Nigeria: Epidemeology and Outcome

Spinal Cord Injury Prevalence and Treatment Modalities

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