Dermatomal Contact Heat Evoked Potentials for the Detection of Subclinical Cervical Spinal Cord Injury in Asymptomatic Degenerative Cervical Cord Compression.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Asymptomatic degenerative cervical cord compression (ADCC) represents a premyelopathic stage of degenerative cervical myelopathy (DCM), with high prevalence in older age and unclear management. Contact heat-evoked potentials (CHEPs) assess the integrity of the thermo-algesic somatosensory pathway and have shown the highest sensitivity among neurophysiological methods in detecting dysfunction in the centromedial and anterior spinal cord in DCM.

Methods

This cross-sectional cohort study evaluated the utility of upper extremity dermatomal C4, C6 and C8 CHEPs (dCHEPs) compared to standard neurophysiological methods-median and tibial nerves somatosensory evoked potentials (SEPs), upper and lower extremity motor evoked potentials (MEPs), and electromyography (EMG)-for d

SUBMITTER: Joppekova L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12696585 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature