Diagnosis by Spinal Cord Potentials of Spinal Diseases

Abstract

Morphological diagnosis of spinal diseases has recently been improved by the development of computed tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and several types of endoscope. On the other hand, functional diagnosis of the spinal diseases has continued to be made through clinical signs and EEG/evoked potentials from the scalp. Recent application of spinal cord potentials to the functional diagnosis of spinal cord diseases has shown great promise for the objective characterization of their pathophysiology (Yamada et al., 2004).