Radiologic imaging of spine injuries

Sports-related spinal injuries can be divided into acute “traumatic” injuries and chronic “overuse” injuries. They mainly occur in sports that either involve highvelocity incidents or falls from heights. In that respect, they do not differ much from other causes of acute spinal injuries. Injuries can be bony with fractures and/or dislocations, soft tissue injuries to ligaments or the disc or spinal cord injuries, and any combination of those. Spinal injuries in chronic overuse occur due to repetitive training and microtrauma. In children and adolescents, they are a major source of morbidity and in fact exceed infectious diseases as a cause of morbidity (Haus and Micheli, Clin Sports Med 31: 423–440, 2012). The most frequent source of back pain in adolescents is spondylolysis; in young adults, disc disease is most frequent, and in older subjects, facet joint disease is most prevalent (Micheli and Wood, Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med 199:15–18, 1995). Recently, the more competitive nature of organized sports and the increased training load, necessary to obtain higher levels of competence, result in more repetitive microtrauma that may lead to overuse failure of spinal structures.