Morphology of the Typical Cervical Vertebral Body and Spinal Canal - Applicability of Torg-Pavlov Ratio in Nigeria

The morphometry of the cervical spine is of clinical importance in traumatic, degenerative and inflammatory conditions. For example a small diameter has been associated with an increase of injury mainly in athletes who participate in contact or collision sports. Before abnormal spinal morphometry can be determined, it is first necessary to establish normal values for the specific patient population being evaluated. Subjects (300) were randomly chosen from the various hospital radiology imaging data bank alongside their medical report in only those reported as normal were utilized. The typical cervical vertebrae C3-C5 were utilized for this study. Subjects demographic variables which include age and sex were recorded alongside the anthropological variables which include the length and width of the vertebral body, the size of the spinal canal. The mean values obtained in all the variables (vertebral body length and breadth, the saggital and transverse spinal canal) showed a decrease as descends the vertebrae C3, C4, C5 with the vertebral length (20.44 + 2.12mm, 19.7 + 2.43), the vertebral body's width (12.89+1.78mm,) and transverse spinal canal (11.74 + 1.53mm, 11.21+1.47mm, 11.19 + 1.31). This study has indeed showed that the gender difference, decrease in vertebral body size form C3 to C5. The Torg Pavlov ratio is however applicable to Nigerians. The result of the present work may help in better understanding of morphological parameters of cervical spine region of Nigerian population. It may be further useful in designing spinal implants which would be biomechanically compatible to the anatomy of Nigeria people.

Key Words: Cervical vertebrae, Nigerian, spinal canal, Torg Pavlov ratio