On July I3, 1951 a healthy young man of 27 fell to the pavement from a height of 40 ft. He suffered multiple injuries, of which the most serious were crush fractures of several vertebrae in the lumbo-dorsal area, and an associated partial cauda equina lesion. He was unable to pass urine, so intermittent catheterisation was employed for a few days followed by tidal drainage through an indwelling...

Transcutaneous electrical stimulation of the central nervous system was used to measure motor conduction velocity in the human spinal cord in 21 subjects aged 22 to 75 years (mean 55 years), none of whom had neurological disease. The motor conduction velocity between the sixth cervical (C6) and first lumbar (L1) vertebral levels was 67.4 +/- 9.1 m/s. This probably represents conduction velocity...

A 53-year-old man presented with a history of slight weakness in the right lower limb. Giant invasive cauda equina schwannoma was diagnosed according to the criteria of Sridhar et al. Schwannomas are usually benign and common tumors arising from nerve sheath cells, particularly from sensory nerves. Giant invasive schwannomas, however, are rare, and most of patients with them present with severe...

The syndrome can progress to paraplegia with rectal and urinary incontinence and represents a surgical emergency.1 Sixty percent of patients are male with a mean age of 42 years, and 82% have a history of chronic low-back pain. In two-thirds of patients, the syndrome is associated with trauma or injury.2 However, cauda equina syndrome should be considered in patients whose chronic back pain has...

Cauda equina syndrome (CES) is a rare but serious neurosurgical emergency that can have devastating longlasting neurologic consequences. CES caused by herniated lumbar discs is rare in the literature. We report an unusual case of incomplete CES due to lumbar disc herniation. The patient presented to our emergency department with acute onset of low back pain, saddle (perineal) anaesthesia, urina...

We present a patient with longstanding ankylosing spondylitis complicated with cauda equina syndrome. The patient suffered from increasing pain in the leg with reduced sensitivity and extremely cold feet associated with incontinence. Diagnostic workup revealed dural ectasia, arachnoiditis and a spinal inflammatory mass leading to extensive vertebral bone destruction. Of interest, this was not o...

The normal intraoperative sonographic features of the spinal canal, spinal cord, conus medullaris, and cauda equina are described and illustrated. Important observations concerning the normal spinal cord include its highly reflective dorsal and ventral surfaces, its uniform hypoechogenicity, and the presence of a central echo. Other easily identified structures within the spinal canal include t...

To compare the long and short term effectiveness and complications of different surgical approaches for Lumber disk protrusion combined with Cauda Equina Syndrome and find a better surgical method for the disease. In this study, follow up records of 144 patients received conventional laminectomy and minimally invasive decompression and fenestration 48 hours within acute injury of lumber disk pr...

Spinal epidural hematoma is a well known complication of spinal surgery. Clinically insignificant small epidural hematomas develop in most spinal surgeries following laminectomy. However, the incidence of clinically significant postoperative spinal epidural hematomas that result in neurological deficits is extremely rare. In this report, we present a 33-year-old female patient whose spinal surg...

Acute cauda equina syndrome can occur due to a variety of causes. Inferior vena cava (IVC) thrombosis has been reported as the causal source of this phenomenon twice in the relevant literature, both cases of which presented in a form complete with a component of bowel and/or bladder dysfunction. The authors report an atypical case of cauda equina syndrome in a patient in a hypercoagulable state...