Standards of Management for Acute Cervical Spinal Cord Injury:

Case Review

Abstract

Because of the lack of guidelines for management of spinal cord injury (SCI), surgical tactics and perioperative management of patients with SCI vary in each hospital. There are broad management approaches including prolonged bedresting with a solid external orthosis or skull-traction, and anterior arthrodesis or posterior arthorodesis. With the advent of spinal instrumentation, internal fixation with combinations of various titanium implants and bone graft without a heavy external orthosis is increasing in popularity for early rehabilitation and an early return to work. In this paper, several cases are presented for consideration and selection of operative procedures.