What Are The Most Common Causes For a Spinal Cord Injury (SCI)?

Spinal cord injuries (SCI) are among the most damaging injuries a human being can incur, and it’s easy to see why: the spinal cord is an information superhighway. Your body’s central nervous system is intertwined with your spinal cord, and that system is pretty darn important. It’s connected at the base of the brain, and it helps your mind control your various limbs and their motion.

And like any highway, this system can’t be diverted or blocked off – otherwise, there’s trouble. And when you experience a spinal cord injury, you definitely put a giant roadblock in the central nervous system. Which is how paralysis occurs.

So what are the most common spinal cord injuries? Let’s discuss a few:

• Motor Vehicle Accident

By far the most common cause of spinal cord injury. Motor vehicles are becoming safer every decade, and traffic fatalities are on a long-term slide. But human beings weren’t meant to sustain injuries in high-speed accidents, or even low-speed ones. In fact, some researches and artists recently explored what it would look like if humans evolved to survive car crashes. The results were… not pretty.

• Falls

It’s actually really dangerous to fall, especially as you get older. For those 65 and up, the leading cause of spinal cord injury is a bad fall. Overall, this is the second-leading cause of SCI nationwide.

• Sports injuries

For folks of a certain age, this should remind you of the late, great Christopher Reeve. The former Superman was paralyzed due to a horse-riding accident, which happens pretty regularly. According to Nature.com, horse-riding injuries are very common in general, and SCI often occurs due to an accident while jumping a horse. However, you can also experience SCI playing hockey or football, or as the result of a skiing or snowboarding accident.