Acute Spinal Cord Injury What is an acute spinal cord injury?
Acute spinal cord injury (SCI) is due to a traumatic injury that
either results in a bruise (also called a contusion), a partial
tear, or a complete tear (called a transection) in the spinal
cord. SCI is a common cause of permanent disability and death in
children. About 12,000 people a year sustain a spinal cord
injury. As many as 231,000 to 311,000 people in the US are
living with a spinal cord injury, according to the Spinal Cord
Injury Information Network. More than half of all SCIs occur
among young people between the ages of 16 and 30 years. The
majority of SCI victims (80.9 percent) are male. What causes an
acute spinal cord injury?There are many causes of SCI in
children. The more common injuries occur when the area of the
spine or neck is bent or compressed as in the following: - birth
injuries, which typically affect the spinal cord in the neck
area - motor vehicle accidents (where the child is either riding
as a passenger in the car or i