Spinal cord infarction and differential diagnosis

Abstract

Spinal cord infarction is a rare disease and constitutes one of the acute spinal emergencies. In comparison to its cerebral counterpart, the spinal cord infarction has extremely low incidence, possibly related to the abundance of the arterial anastomosis and low incidence of the atherosclerosis in the spinal arteries. Since the first spinal cord infarction reported in early nineteenth century, there has been remarkable progress in the understanding of this disease entity. However, the fact that there is no established standard of care treatment as of today highlights the complexity and challenging nature of this disease. In this chapter the arterial anatomy of the spinal cord, etiopathogenesis, and clinical presentation of the cord infarction with specific emphasis on the imaging findings and differential diagnosis are discussed. The role of catheter angiography was specifically addressed along with the merits and pitfalls of the noninvasive angiography. The chapter concludes a discussion on the current and potential future treatment strategies.