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Surgery of the Spinal Cord pp 339–352Cite as

Surgery of the Infected Spine and Spinal Cord Function

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Part of the book series: Contemporary Perspectives in Neurosurgery ((COPENEU))

Abstract

The surgical treatment of spinal infections has taught us a great deal about the pathophysiology of the spinal cord. In the past 15 years at St. Luke’s—Roosevelt, we have operated on 23 patients with various forms of Pott’s paraplegia and done 61 anterior explorations for pyogenic infections in 57 patients (cervical 24, thoracic 14, lumbar 23). During the same period, we have done more than 250 anterior explorations of the spine for tumor. Successful surgery required adequate decompression and maintenance of bony stability. Surgical cases in our series of spinal infections presented a myriad of combinations of cord compression and spinal instability. In my discussion of the cases presented, we will point out that the blood supply of the spinal cord does not appear to be precarious. Cord infarction from the anterior transthoracic surgery does not appear to be a problem. We believe that the deleterious effects of infection arise from mechanical compression, not from “arteritis or phlebitis,” and that it is rare in spinal surgery to have a vascular spinal cord complication except in the vigorous correction of scoliosis.

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Authors
  1. James E. O. Hughes
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  2. George V. DiGiacinto
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  3. Narayan Sundaresan
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University, New York, NY, 10021, USA

    Robert N. N. Holtzman MD (Assistant Clinical Professor of Neurological Surgery, Adjunct Neurosurgeon) (Assistant Clinical Professor of Neurological Surgery, Adjunct Neurosurgeon)

  2. Lenox Hill Hospital, New York, NY, 10021, USA

    Robert N. N. Holtzman MD (Assistant Clinical Professor of Neurological Surgery, Adjunct Neurosurgeon) (Assistant Clinical Professor of Neurological Surgery, Adjunct Neurosurgeon)

  3. College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University, New York, NY, 10032, USA

    Bennett M. Stein MD (Byron Stookey Professor of Neurological Surgery, Chairman of the Department of Neurological Surgery) (Byron Stookey Professor of Neurological Surgery, Chairman of the Department of Neurological Surgery)

  4. The New York Neurological Institute, New York, NY, 10032, USA

    Bennett M. Stein MD (Byron Stookey Professor of Neurological Surgery, Chairman of the Department of Neurological Surgery) (Byron Stookey Professor of Neurological Surgery, Chairman of the Department of Neurological Surgery)

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© 1992 Springer-Verlag New York, Inc.

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Hughes, J.E.O., DiGiacinto, G.V., Sundaresan, N. (1992). Surgery of the Infected Spine and Spinal Cord Function. In: Holtzman, R.N.N., Stein, B.M. (eds) Surgery of the Spinal Cord. Contemporary Perspectives in Neurosurgery. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-2798-4_17

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-2798-4_17

  • Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4612-7675-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4612-2798-4

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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