The classifications of subaxial cervical spine traumatic injuries. Part 1. General principles

Abstract

http://theunj.org patients with spinal cord injury determine the progressively increasing costs for medical and social life support expenses. A large number of experimental and clinical studies, improvement of methods for surgical correction and stabilization of the damaged vertebral motor segment undoubtedly dictate certain changes in the tactics of treatment. The classification of traumatic spinal injuries is of key importance in determining the approaches, timing and volume of surgical intervention. Following the care algorithms helps to minimize the negative effects of traumatic damage to both the spine and the spinal cord and contributes to the maximum possible recovery of neurological functions. The last few decades have been characterized by the gradual replacement of the previously widely used "morphological" classifications of traumatic injuries of the cervical spine to "clinical" ones, based on an analysis of some heterogeneous factors determining treatment tactics. The first part of the review deals with a detailed description of the main criteria used in developing modern "clinical" classifications of subaxial cervical spine traumatic injuries. Besides, modern views on imaging methods and algorithms for determining the need to perform diagnostic procedures at primary hospitalization in patients with suspected cervical spine traumatic injury are presented.