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Skull Traction and Cervical Cord Injury

A New Approach to Improved Rehabilitation

  • Book
  • © 1989

Overview

Authors:
  1. Alf Breig

    1. Karolinska Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden
      Söderhamn, Sweden

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Table of contents (10 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages I-XIII
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  3. A New Approach to Improved Rehabilitation

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 57-57
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    2. Surgical Procedure for Cervicolordodesis

      • Alf Breig
      Pages 59-71

    3. Therapeutic Breadth of Surgically Secured Spinal Cord Relaxation

      • Alf Breig
      Pages 72-74

    4. Summary of Part II

      • Alf Breig
      Pages 75-81

    5. References

      • Alf Breig
      Pages 82-84
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Keywords

About this book

In this book on the optimal treatment of the injured spinal cord we present the reasons why we consider it necessary to handle trauma­ tized medullary tissue in accordance with the classical biological principles of wound healing in general, namely by long-term, ten­ sion-free immobilization of the spinal cord. Today, such immobili­ zation for this purpose can only be achieved by surgical secure­ ment of slight dorsiflexion of the cervical spine. Traumatically compressed medullary tissue is invariably attenu­ ated and weakened. On application of skull traction, the weakened section of the compressed cervical cord is the part that is most overstretched. This inevitably results in increased neurological def­ icit. On scrutiny of the clinical records of 100 tetraplegic patients treated by skull traction at the National Spinal Injuries Centre at the Stoke Mandeville Hospital, Aylesbury, England, from 1971 to 1982, we found that therapeutic skull traction had been followed by an immediate increase in neurological deficit in 12% of the patients - a relatively high figure for the type of case in which beneficial effects oftraction were habitually anticipated. Moreover, in studies on cadavers, artificial defects in fresh human cervical cord in situ showed typical deformation following application of traction, confirming the basic deleterious effects of therapeutic skull traction on the injured cervical cord.

Authors and Affiliations

  • Karolinska Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden

    Alf Breig

  • Söderhamn, Sweden

    Alf Breig

Bibliographic Information

  • Book Title: Skull Traction and Cervical Cord Injury

  • Book Subtitle: A New Approach to Improved Rehabilitation

  • Authors: Alf Breig

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-22410-6

  • Publisher: Springer Berlin, Heidelberg

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

  • Copyright Information: Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 1989

  • Softcover ISBN: 978-3-540-50414-6Published: 16 February 1989

  • eBook ISBN: 978-3-662-22410-6Published: 29 June 2013

  • Edition Number: 1

  • Number of Pages: XIII, 84

  • Topics: Rehabilitation, Neurosurgery

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