Objective A screening survey for osteoporotic fractures in men and women in Hong Kong represents the first large-scale prospective population-based study on bone health in elderly (≥65 years) Chinese men and women. This study aims to identify the prevalence and potential risk factors of lumbar spondylolisthesis in these subjects. Methods The lateral lumbar radiographs of 1,994 male and 1,996 female patients were analysed using the Meyerding classification. Results Amongst the men, 380 (19.1 %) had at least one spondylolisthesis and 43 (11.3 %) had slips at two or more levels; 283 had anterolisthesis, 85 had retrolisthesis, whereas 12 subjects had both anterolisthesis and retrolisthesis. Amongst the women, 499 (25.0 %) had at least one spondylolisthesis and 69 (13.8 %) had slips at two or more levels; 459 had anterolisthesis, 34 had retrolisthesis, whereas 6 subjects had both anterolisthesis and retrolisthesis. Advanced age, short height, higher body mass index (BMI), higher bone mineral density (BMD) and degenerative arthritis are associated with spondylolisthesis. Lower Physical Activity Scale for the Elderly (PASE) score was associated with spondylolisthesis in men; higher body weight, angina and lower grip strength were associated with spondylolisthesis in women. Conclusion The male/female ratio of lumbar spondylolisthesis prevalence was 1:1.3 in elderly Chinese. Men are more likely to have retrolisthesis.

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Several neuroimaging studies have suggested brain reorganisation in patients with cervical spondylotic myelopathy (CSM); however, the changes in spontaneous neuronal activity that are associated with connectedness remain largely unknown. In this study, functional connectivity strength (FCS), a data-driven degree centrality method based on a theoretical approach, was applied for the first time to investigate changes in the sensory-motor network (SMN) at the voxel level. Comparatively, CSM not only showed significantly decreased FCS in the operculum-integrated regions, which exhibited reduced resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) around the Rolandic sulcus, but it also showed increased FCS in the premotor, primary somatosensory, and parietal-integrated areas, which primarily showed an enhanced rsFC pattern. Correlation analysis showed that altered FCS (in the left premotor-ventral/precentral-operculum, right operculum-parietale 4, and right S1) was associated with worsening Japanese Orthopaedic Association scores and that the rsFC pattern was influenced by cervical cord micro-structural damage at the C2 level. Together, these findings suggest that during myelopathy, the intrinsic functional plasticity of the SMN responds to the insufficient sensory and motor experience in CSM patients. This knowledge may improve our understanding of the comprehensive functional defects found in CSM patients and may inspire the development of new therapeutic strategies in the future.

Despite years' research, the radiographic criteria for osteoporotic vertebral fracture and its grading remain debated. The importance of identifying vertebral endplate/cortex fracture (ECF) is being recognised; however, evaluation of osteoporotic ECF requires training and experience. This article aims to serve as a teaching material for radiologists/physicians or researchers to evaluate osteoporotic ECF. Emphasis is particularly dedicated to identifying ECF that may not be associated with apparent vertebral body collapse. We suggest a combined approach based on standardised radiologic evaluation by experts and morphometry measurement is the most appropriate approach to detect and classify osteoporotic vertebral fractures.The translational potentialA good understanding of radiologic anatomy of vertebrae and fracture signs of endplate/cortex are essential for spine fragility fracture assessment.

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Functional disconnectivity during the resting state has been observed in mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) patients during the acute stage. However, it remains largely unknown whether the abnormalities are related to specific frequency bands of the low-frequency oscillations (LFO). Here, we used the amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF) to examine the amplitudes of LFO in different frequency bands (slow-5: 0.01–0.027 Hz; slow-4: 0.027–0.073 Hz; and typical: 0.01–0.08 Hz) in patients with acute mTBI. A total of 24 acute mTBI patients and 24 age-, sex-, and education-matched healthy controls participated in this study. In the typical band, acute mTBI patients showed lower standardized ALFF in the right middle frontal gyrus and higher standardized ALFF in the right lingual/fusiform gyrus and left middle occipital gyrus. Further analyses showed that the difference between groups was concentrated in a narrower (slow-4) frequency band. In the slow-5 band, mTBI patients only exhibited higher standardized ALFF in the occipital areas. No significant correlation between the mini-mental state examination score and the standardized ALFF value was found in any brain region in the three frequency bands. Finally, no significant interaction between frequency bands and groups was found in any brain region. We concluded that the abnormality of spontaneous brain activity in acute mTBI patients existed in the frontal lobe as well as in distributed brain regions associated with integrative, sensory, and emotional roles, and the abnormal spontaneous neuronal activity in different brain regions could be better detected by the slow-4 band. These findings might contribute to a better understanding of local neural psychopathology of acute mTBI. Future studies should take the frequency bands into account when measuring intrinsic brain activity of mTBI patients.

Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) is characterized by structural disconnection and large-scale neural network dysfunction in the resting state. However, little is known concerning the intrinsic changes in local spontaneous brain activity in patients with mTBI. The aim of the current study was to assess regional synchronization in acute mTBI patients. Fifteen acute mTBI patients and 15 sex-, age-, and education-matched healthy controls (HCs) were studied. We used the regional homogeneity (ReHo) method to map local connectivity across the whole brain and performed a two-sample t-test between the two groups. Compared with HCs, patients with acute mTBI showed significantly decreased ReHo in the left insula, left precentral/postcentral gyrus, and left supramarginal gyrus (p < 0.05, AlphaSim corrected). The ReHo index of the left insula showed a positive correlation with the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) scores across all acute mTBI patients (p < 0.05, uncorrected). The ReHo method may provide an objective biomarker for evaluating the functional abnormity of mTBI in the acute setting.