title: Lumbar facet fracture in an adolescent ice hockey player.
abstract: A 14-year-old boy was checked hard as he was winding up to shoot in an ice hockey game. He experienced low-back pain during the game but when examined later for complaints of pain and fever, he denied trauma. Plain x-rays were normal, but a bone scan showed increased uptake at L-3. MRI evaluation revealed a lumbar mass; a CT scan showed the mass to be a hematoma and edema secondary to a facet fracture. Acute severe back pain in a hockey player should prompt a careful history and a search for musculoskeletal injury. When trauma in the lumbar spine is suspected and plain radiographs are nondiagnostic, CT scans are more precise than MRI for diagnosing injury.
authors.affiliation: Saint Louis University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO, 63110-0250, USA.
authors.forename: W O
authors.initials: WO
authors.lastname: Shaffer
authors.forename: M R
authors.initials: MR
authors.lastname: Taylor
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sundaram