Evaluating Sensory Restoration Following Surgical Intervention for Tethered Cord Syndrome: A Scoping Review and Illustrative Cases
Bibliographic record
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Tethered cord syndrome (TCS) is characterized by the caudal anchoring of the spinal cord, causing restricted movement and tension, leading to neurologic, urologic, musculoskeletal, and gastrointestinal symptoms. Neuropathic sensory loss in the lower extremities is prevalent, increasing infection risk and, in severe cases, resulting in amputation. The potential for sensory recovery following surgical intervention in TCS has not been thoroughly documented. This study reviews existing literature and presents 2 illustrative cases of sensory recovery following surgical intervention in TCS patients with severe neuropathic sensory loss leading to amputation. METHODS: A scoping literature review was conducted according to Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines to evaluate sensory changes presurgery and postsurgery in TCS patients. Two reviewers independently screened, extracted data, and assessed study quality using the Newcastle-Ottawa Scale. Additionally, chart reviews were conducted for 2 patients who underwent limb amputation and experienced sensory return following tethered cord intervention. RESULTS: The review revealed 1 case series and 4 retrospective cohort studies on sensation following TCS release, all reporting significant postoperative improvements in pain, strength, and notably, sensation. None specifically addressed TCS-related amputations. Two cases are presented where amputee patients with severe neuropathic sensory loss from TCS experienced sensory recovery after surgical interventions. CONCLUSIONS: Sensory loss in TCS can lead to sequelae as severe as amputations from repeated wound infections. Surgical intervention may play a role in preventing and treating sensory loss in TCS patients. Further investigation into the mechanisms of sensory loss in TCS is needed.
Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.
How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.004 | 0.017 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.002 | 0.003 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.015 | 0.012 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".