STUDY DESIGN: A hospital-based retrospective epidemiological study. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to examine the demographic and epidemiological characteristics of patients with Traumatic Spinal Cord Injury (TSCI) in Guangdong to help health-related institutions develop measures to determine the best allocation of medical resources. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA: 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 1340 patients with TSCI, and the annual number of TSCI admissions increased during the 2003 to 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% (337/1340) 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). CONCLUSION: There are specific epidemiological characteristics of TSCIpatients in Guangdong, and preventive measures are suggested to focus on high-risk populations, such as adult men. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: 3.
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