Abstract:

Objective: Lumbosacral transitional vertebrae (LSTV) are commonly seen congenital anomalies of the lumbosacral spine, and named according to the transition type as sacralization or lumbarization. The aim of this study was to determine whether LSTV have influence on sagittal spinal alignment and coronal spinal asymmetry. Materials and Methods: Anteroposterior and lateral full-length standing X-rays of young adult army officer candidates, who were admitted for health screening between January 2018 and January 2019, were extracted from the medical electronic database. Among these X-rays, those belonging to participants with sacralization and lumbarization were identified. The cervical lordosis, thoracic kyphosis and lumbar lordosis were measured on lateral X-rays and coronal spinal angle, if exist, were measured on anteroposterior X-ray with Cobb angle. Sagittal and coronal parameters were compared among participants with lumbarization, participants with sacralization and that of age- and sex-matched controls without LSTV. Results: Of the 179 X-rays extracted from the database, 30 (16.8%) were participants with sacralization, 69 (38.5%) were participants with lumbarization and 90 (50.3%) were controls. Participants with lumbarization had significantly greater cervical and lumbar lordosis angles than those without LSTV (controls). However, thoracic kyphosis angle did not differ among three groups. Based on coronal spinal measure, controls had higher spinal asymmetry values than participants with sacralization and participants with lumbarization. Curve patterns found in this study were single thoracic and single lumbar patterns. Conclusion: The finding of this study demonstrated that individuals without LSTV were more likely to develop coronal spinal asymmetry. This study also suggested considering lumbarization for increase in physiological cervical and lumbar sagittal angles.

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