Understanding Spinal Injuries for International Spinal Cord Injury Day 2026.
Most people with back pain spend a few weeks, sometimes months working out whether it is worth getting it checked. In most cases, they are right to wait, most back pain passes on its own. Occasionally, waiting is the worst thing to do.
5th September is International Spinal Cord Injury Day - more than 105,000 people in the UK are living with a spinal cord injury and around 4,700 new cases happen every year, that is roughly twelve people a day. Spinal cord injuries are managed by specialist NHS teams and that management is not within our remit as chiropractors. Knowing when spinal pain needs urgent medical attention is.
Most back and neck pain is mechanical. It hurts, limits you for a period of time and then it settles. Screening for anything more serious is part of every initial consultation we do. Most of the time, there is nothing serious to find.
When Back Pain Is An Emergency:
Go to A&E if back pain comes with any of the following:
• Trouble passing urine, or not being able to feel when your bladder is full
• Losing control of your bladder or bowels
• Numbness or a change in sensation around the groin, genitals or back passage
• Numbness or weakness in both legs
• Loss of sensation during sex
These are the warning signs of cauda equina syndrome, where the nerves at the bottom of the spinal canal become compressed. It is rare but is also a surgical emergency, and the window for treatment is 24-48 hours. Waiting too long increases the risk of lifelong paralysis, severe sensory loss and permanent incontinence.
Do not book in with us. Do not wait for a GP appointment. You will not be wasting anyone’s time. A&E staff would far rather see ten people whose symptoms turn out to be nothing than miss the one person who needed surgery that night.
Signs In The Neck And Hands:
Compression higher up the spine does not present as clearly as in the lower back. It builds over weeks and months, so people put it down to getting older.
Things worth paying attention to:
• Buttons, zips and keys becoming fiddly
• Handwriting getting worse
• Dropping things more than you used to
• Pins and needles in both hands
• Feeling unsteady on your feet
• Heaviness in both legs
One of these on its own is probably nothing, several of them together, getting worse over time, is worth a GP appointment. It is important to explain these symptoms as they are far more important than a stiff neck.
Don't Ignore Falls
The space around the spinal cord narrows as the spine ages, this is a normal finding, this narrowing makes the cord easier to injure in a minor accident. A fall that a twenty five year old gets up from can cause real damage at seventy five. If you are in your thirties reading this, then pass it on to your parents. Falls cause more spinal cord injuries worldwide that than anything else, including road traffic accidents. They are also far more common than most people think. NICE estimate that around 30% of people over 65 and 50% of people over 89 have at least one fall a year.
Give this test a try:
Stand on one leg, with something nearby to hold, and count to ten.
In a study of 1,702 people aged between 51 and 75, one in five could not do it. By around age 70, roughly half could not. If you managed ten seconds without wobbling, that's great. If you did not, then practice makes perfect; the more you train, the better you'll be. Without practice, you are more at risk of a fall.
Strength and balance decline through lack of use but the good news is that both can be trained no matter your age.
Leg strength - through sit to stands, step ups, your hips and thighs help regain your control stopping a stumble from being a fall.
Balance - stand on one leg while you brush your teeth, learn to balance with your eyes close but always have something nearby to hold.
Ankle mobility - stiff ankles mean you cannot correct yourself when a foot lands awkwardly or on something.
Get your eyes tested - your vision changes gradually and you may not notice it happening.
Sort the house - loose rugs, dark stairs, and loose cables cause a lot of falls, even if you do have strength.
Stay active - people who become frightened of falling start to move less out of fear, so then they get weaker, resulting in more falls.
Who Is Most At Risk:
Men and women both have two points in their lives when they are more at risk of spinal cord injuries. Men in their 20's mostly from sport, work and road traffic accidents, the second is in their 70's onwards mostly from falls. Women's first is in their teenage years, the second starts from around 60.
The advice we would give to each are different. If you play sports then work on your technique, your neck strength and how you handle injuries when they happen. If you're older and at risk of fall, then work on your balance, leg strength and the condition of your stairs and flooring.
We go through life not having to think about your spinal cord because it just does its job, the moment it can't work effectively, your life changes dramatically
If this sounds like you or someone you know, it's time to make small changes so that you don't have to make big ones in the future.