Pathophysiology of Spinal Cord Injury

Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a devastating condition that impacts every system in the body. There are about 25 million people globally living with SCI as a result of a traumatic event. There are various complications of SCI including physical, emotional, as well as financial. In this chapter, we discuss the anatomy of the spinal cord and tie it to the various clinical presentations of SCI. We also describe widely used clinical assessment tools and lay out the foundation for standardized classification terminologies. This chapter further expands on the pre-hospital care and hospital management, as well as examines the benefits of early surgical interventions. We also explore the efficacy of some neuroprotective and neuroregenerative interventions by evaluating clinical trials.