Blood Supply to the Spinal Cord

Abstract

To the Editor: In the July 2000 issue of Physical Therapy , Mautes et al, in an article titled “Vascular Events After Spinal Cord Injury: Contribution to Secondary Pathogenesis,”1 described the blood supply to the spinal cord. The authors stated that a segmental spinal artery enters the intervertebral foramen and divides into 3 branches outside the spinal canal at each segmental level of the spinal cord: the anterior and posterior longitudinal spinal canal arteries and the radicular artery. Furthermore, Mautes et al described the radicular artery continuing along the nerve root and dividing into an anterior radicular artery and a posterior radicular artery. They stated that, after penetrating the dura mater, the anterior and posterior radicular arteries join the 3 major arteries on the surface of the spinal cord to provide the blood supply to those areas. Mautes et al cited references by Crock and Yoshizawa2 and Domisse3 in their description of the extrinsic blood supply to the spinal cord. Although Mautes and colleagues' description of anterior and …