Prehospital emergency care : official journal of the National Association of EMS Physicians and the National Association of State EMS Directors
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Multicenter Study Clinical Trial
The reliability of prehospital clinical evaluation for potential spinal injury is not affected by the mechanism of injury.
Traditional EMS teaching identifies mechanism of injury as an important predictor of spinal injury. Clinical criteria to select patients for immobilization are being studied in Michigan and have been implemented in Maine. Maine requires automatic immobilization of patients with "a positive mechanism" clearly capable of producing spinal injury. ⋯ Mechanism of injury does not affect the ability of clinical criteria to predict spinal injury in this population.