Tapia Syndrome After Cervical Laminoplasty: A Case Report and Review of the Literature.

BACKGROUND: Tapia syndrome is a rare complication of surgical positioning with resulting unilateral cranial nerve X and XII deficits that may provide diagnostic challenges in the perioperative period. Timely diagnosis will facilitate obtaining the necessary supportive care while preventing unnecessary workup and procedures. CASE DESCRIPTION: The following case report illustrates a patient that developed Tapia syndrome immediately after a posterior cervical laminoplasty with eventual resolution of symptoms. A review of the literature was also undertaken for comparison. CONCLUSIONS: Tapia syndrome can occur with a variety of surgeries, but appear to be most common in surgeries of the posterior cervical spine in the neurosurgical literature. It is theorized that flexed head position common among posterior cervical procedures makes patients more prone to Tapia syndrome in these cases. The ideal management remains poorly defined in the literature. The time course and resolution of neurologic deficits support a transient neuropraxic mechanism in most cases, though some patients do suffer permanent deficits.

A comparison of computed tomography measures for diagnosing cervical spinal stenosis associated with myelopathy: a case-control study.

STUDY DESIGN: Retrospective comparative study. PURPOSE: To assess differences in computed tomography (CT) imaging parameters between patients with cervical myelopathy and controls. OVERVIEW OF LITERATURE: There is a lack of information regarding the best predictor of symptomatic stenosis based on osseous canal dimensions. We postulate that smaller osseous canal dimensions increase the risk of symptomatic central stenosis. METHODS: CT images and medical records of patients with cervical myelopathy (19 patients, 8 males; average age, 64.4±13.4 years) and controls (18 patients, 14 males; average age, 60.4±11.0 years) were collected. A new measure called the laminar roof pitch angle (=angle between the lamina) was conducted along with linear measures, ratios and surrogates of canal perimeter and area at each level C2-C7 (222 levels). Receiver-operator curves were used to assess the diagnostic value of each. Rater reliability was assessed for the measures. RESULTS: The medial-lateral (ML) diameter (at mid-pedicle level) and calculated canal area (=anterior-posterior.×ML diameters) were the most accurate and highly reliable. ML diameter below 23.5 mm and calculated canal area below 300 mm(2) generated 82% to 84% sensitivity and 67% to 68% sensitivity. No significant correlations were identified between age, height, weight, body mass in dex and gender for each of the CT measures. CONCLUSIONS: CT measures including ML dimensions were most predictive. This study is the first to identify an important role for the ML dimension in cases of slowly progressive compressive myelopathy. A ML reserve may be protective when the canal is progressively compromised in the anterior-posterior dimension.