Nouvelles données sur l’épidémiologie passée et actuelle de la spondylolyse lombo-sacrée et son association avec la spina bifida occulta

Abstract

Spondylolysis is a bony defect of the pars interarticularis mainly arising from repeated traumas. Other factors such as spina bifida occulta (SBO) are mentioned in clinical and palaeopathology but have been little studied. The aim of our study is to provide information on the prevalence of lumbar spondylolysis and its association with SBO in three samples: 1) a sample from the general contemporary French population (CT scans from the Nord hospital in Marseille); 2) a large mediaeval and modern osteoarchaeological collection from the cemetery of Notre-Dame-du-Bourg cathedral (NDB) (Digne-les-Bains, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence); and finally, 3) a corpus of prevalence data taken from the literature. Our results show that for the contemporary population, 26 out of 496 adult patients aged 18 to 69 years displayed at least one lumbar spondylolysis (5.2%). Its prevalence was significantly higher among patients with SBO (Odds ratio 3.8). In the NDB series, 9 individuals out of 455 had spondylolysis (2.0%). The prevalence was higher in the mediaeval period (3.5%) than in the modern period (0.5%). The same trend was found in our analysis of all European data in the literature, and the prevalence of spondylolysis was not associated with the presence of SBO.

Keywords

• spondylolysis
• spina bifida occulta
• palaeopathology
• ancient populations
• computed tomography