Yang R, Guo L, Huang L, Wang P, Tang Y, Ye J, Chen K, Hu X, Cai Z, Lu C, Wu Y, Shen H. Spine 2016; 42(9): E555-E561.
Affiliation
*Department of Orthopedics, Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hospital, Sun Yat-sen University, 107# Yan Jiang Xi Road, Guangzhou 510120, People's Republic of China †Department of Medical statistics and Epidemiology, school of public health, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510080, People's Republic of China.
STUDY DESIGN: A hospital-based retrospective epidemiological study.
OBJECTIVE: To examine the demographic and epidemiological characteristics of patients with TSCI in Guangdong to help health-related institutions develop measures to determine the best allocation of medical resources. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA: Traumatic spinal cord injury (TSCI) is a highly disabling and deadly injury. Currently, there is little information regarding the epidemiological characteristics for TSCI in Guangdong.
METHODS: We retrospectively reviewed the medical records of partial second-grade class-A hospitals (mainly capturing general city and county hospitals and some large-scale affiliated hospitals) in Guangdong province according to the International Classification of Disease Version 10 (ICD-10) and diagnostic code of TSCI.
RESULTS: The study included the medical records of 1,340 patients with TSCI, and the annual number of TSCI admissions increased during the 2003-2011 period. The male-to-female ratio was approximately 3.5:1. The major causes of spinal cord injuries were high falls (41.0%) and traffic accidents (37.8%). The most common injury among patients with TSCI was cervical injury (818 cases). In addition, 62.9% of the patients had spinal fractures, 24.0% had other fractures, and 13.7% had brain injuries. Furthermore, 25.1% (337/1,340) of the patients experienced clinical complications. The differences in the number of patients with and without complete injury who accepted surgery and hyperbaric oxygen therapy were statistically significant (P < 0.05), and the difference in total medical cost was significant (P < 0.05).
CONCLUSIONS: The epidemiological characteristics of TSCI in Guangdong has its own characteristics, and preventive measures should focus on high-risk populations, such as adult men. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: 3.