title: The widened interspinous distance: a useful sign of anterior cervical dislocation in the supine frontal projection.
abstract: Anterior dislocation of the cervical spine may be detected reliably in the supine frontal projection by evaluating the cervical spinous processes. A widened interspinous distance (ISD) which measures more than one and one-half times the ISD above and more than one and one-half times the ISD below indicates the presence of an anterior cervical dislocation at the level of abnormal widening. Measurements of the interspinous distances from the C3-C4 interval through the C7-T1 interval in 500 patients with normal cervical spines and in 14 patients with documented anterior cervical dislocations revealed neither false positive nor false negative diagnoses by these criteria.
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002574:Cervical Vertebrae / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000293:injuries*; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D004204:Joint Dislocations / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011859:Radiography