SCI Facts and Figures

In reviewing some of my recent posts, it seems I am focusing on disability issues. I want to continue doing that and give you a great website to learn more about spinal cord injury facts and the incidence and prevalence of SCI in the United States. If you are a spinal cord injured person, have a family member or friend who has a SCI, or just want to learn more about the issue, you should check out this page and the rest of this website.

According to the National Spinal Cord Injury Database's website:

The National Spinal Cord Injury Database has been in existence since 1973 and captures data from an estimated 13% of new SCI cases in the U.S. Since its inception, 26 federally funded Model SCI Care Systems have contributed data to the National SCI Database. As of October 2007 the database contained information on 25,415 persons who sustained traumatic spinal cord injuries.

You can get to the rest of this piece by clicking here.

One of the interesting trends I have seen these last several years is the changing terminology. One word in particular is changing — quadriplegia is being replaced by tetraplegia. They mean the same thing, and I am not quite sure why the change. Do you know? This article uses tetraplegia throughout.

In my mind, I will always be a quad. To me, a tertra is a tropical fish. Of course, that's coming from an old quad.

I look forward to your comments.

Later,

Mike