Sound decisions: real-time ultrasound in the management of traumatic spinal cord injury.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Traumatic spinal cord injury (tSCI) is a devastating neurological emergency with high morbidity and no proven therapies that reliably improve recovery. While early decompression and hemodynamic optimization are standard, clinicians lack imaging tools to stratify injury severity or monitor physiological responses in real time. Advances in high-resolution B-mode, contrast-enhanced ultrasound, and multiparametric approaches offer a unique opportunity to close this gap and improve patient-specific treatment strategies.

RECENT FINDINGS: Ultrasound can: characterize injury morphology, revealing cord swelling, hemorrhage, and parenchymal disruption; verify and optimize cord decompression by visualizing restoration of the subarachnoid space, and cerebrospinal fluid pulsatility; assess cord perfusion in real time with contrast-enhanced ultrasound, and guide targeted interventions in acute and chronic tSCI, including therapeutic delivery, blood-spinal cord barrier modulation, and neuromodulation. Preclinical models and early clinical series increasingly validate these applications.

SUMMARY: Integrating ultrasound into tSCI care could yield actionable biomarkers, enhance intraoperative and critical care decision-making, and accelerate the translation of novel therapies. Future priorities include standardizing imaging protocols, validating prognostic metrics, correlating imaging findings with long-term outcomes, and developing portable systems for continuous, patient-specific monitoring.