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Chapter 17 - Traumatic and Nontraumatic Spinal Cord Disorders

from Section 3 - Specific Neurological Disorders in Emergency Medicine

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 January 2024

By
Thomas F. Scott ,
Nestor Tomycz  and
David Jho
Edited by
Thomas P. Campbell  and
Kevin M. Kelly
Thomas P. Campbell
Affiliation:
Allegheny Health Network, Pittsburgh
Kevin M. Kelly
Affiliation:
Allegheny Health Network, Pittsburgh
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Summary

Traumatic spinal cord injury requires urgent imaging and decision-making involving a team approach. Causes of nontraumatic spinal cord injury are protean and can be roughly divided into compressive and non-compressive disease states. In general, it is the scenario of compressive spinal injury that needs to be identified quickly for possible urgent surgical decompression, whereas non-compressive injury requires a systematic work-up, which is somewhat less urgent. MRI is the imaging modality of choice for essentially all acute spinal cord disorders presenting to the ED, and the physician is charged with expeditious performance of this testing whenever spinal cord compression is deemed a likely possibility.

Keywords

spinal cord infarctioncentral cord syndromeanterior cord syndromeposterior cord syndromeBrown–Sequard syndromecauda equina syndrometransverse myelitismyelopathyLlermitte signspinal shock
Type
Chapter
Information
Handbook of Emergency Neurology , pp. 246 - 268
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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