A novel case of “ambulatory” cervical spondyloptosis: case report with literature review

Abstract

Cervical spondyloptosis is an extreme variant of cervical spinal injury where patients usually present with disabling neurological deficits. Presentation of these patients without significant morbidity is very rare and we could only find sporadic case reports in literature involving traumatic cervical spondyloptosis without neurological deficits. Usually such patients get spared due to expansion of spinal canal after fracture of posterior vertebral elements. We report a case of traumatic C5/C6 spondyloptosis in an ambulatory patient despite having an intact posterior vertebral arch. This patient was managed successfully with anterior cervical fusion. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first case report of its kind as it exemplifies the rarity of such an occurrence and underlines the importance of timely management to maintain such preserved neurological status.