We attempted to evaluate the effect on the spinal column of loss of
muscular support following trauma to the spinal cord during childhood. The
cases of fifty patients, newborn to seventeen years old at the time of
injury, were analyzed. Thirty-one patients had scoliotic curves of more
than 20 degrees; twenty-one of these were long paralytic curves of 40
degrees or more. Age at injury was the single most important risk factor in
the development of scoliosis; spasticity was also a very significant
factor. Patients with lesions at all neural levels were at risk, while
laminectomy was not a significant cause of scoliosis. On lateral
roentgenograms the predominant finding was a reversal of the lumbar
lordosis into a kyphosis, with the resultant development of a long
thoracolumbar kyphosis. In five patients the opposite deformity,
thoracolumbar lordosis, developed.