ArticlesA demographic profile of new traumatic spinal cord injuries: Change and stability over 30 years
Section snippets
Methods
At the time of this study, the NSCID housed records for 30,532 persons admitted to a MSCIS within 365 days of injury between 1973 and March 2003. Eligibility criteria and changes in those criteria over time have been described previously.1, 7
The NSCID contains information on new injuries in 2 separate data sets. The Registry data set contains very limited demographic and injury severity information on persons treated at the MSCIS for whom follow-up data will not be collected. Persons enrolled
Results
Over the last 30 years, the MSCIS facilities have admitted 30,532 people who sustained a traumatic SCI and otherwise satisfied Registry or Form I dataset criteria (table 1). The average was over 1100 cases per year for the period from 1980 onward. The average was lower in the 1970s when the number of MSCIS facilities was small but expanding. Because data for the years following 2000 are limited to 4.75 years (a cutoff of data entry was made after 9mo into 2003), it is too early to determine
Discussion
With an estimated incidence around 40 cases per million, SCI is a fairly uncommon cause of disability. However, its costs, both economic and social, are out of proportion to its frequency.11, 12, 13, 14 It is thus important to review the database trends to gain understanding of the ramifications of this traumatic event. This study examines the significant trends over the past 30 years and suggests how these correspond with the trends in the general population.
One significant trend is the change
Conclusions
This new analysis of the latest trends in the epidemiology of SCI has revealed several new findings relative to the last report on this topic from the MSCIS.6 These include dramatic declines in the percentages of neurologically complete injuries, cases caused by acts of violence and certain recreational activities such as diving, along with a significant increase in the percentage of ventilator-dependent cases. A continuation in the previously reported trend toward increasing mean age at injury
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Supported by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Services, US Department of Education (grant nos. H133N000016, H133N000027, H133A011201).
No commercial party having a direct interest in the results of the research supporting this article has or will confer a benefit on the author(s) or on any organization with which the author(s) is/are associated.