Roentgenographic and computerized tomography based morphometric analysis of cervical spinal canal diameters to establish normative measurements in an Indian population

Compressive cervical myelopathy secondary to degenerative changes in the cervical spine is a common cause of neurologic morbidity in the elderly. Identification of canal stenosis and addressing it surgically in addition to the obvious compressive lesions is essential to obtain satisfactory results. We attempt to define the saggital and transverse diameters in a normal adult population presenting at our centre with head injuries. We found that the values were lower than those reported in comparable studies for a western population, and also that the dimensions in women are significantly lower than in men.