Epidemiological Characteristics of Traumatic Spinal Cord Injury (TSCI) in the Middle-East and North-Africa (MENA) Region: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

To systematically search the literature and to summarize current evidence pertaining to the epidemiology of SCI in the MENA region incidence, gender, age, type of the injury and etiology of the injury.
Embase, PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science and EBSCOhost were systematically searched from their dates of inception till July 2017 for English and non-English language articles. Also, regional databases were searched. Data were extracted from eligible articles and pooled under the random effect model using R. References of the included articles were also screened for potentially relevant studies.
We identified 29 articles from seven countries in the MENA region (Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait and Qatar). The mean age of the cases at time of injury was 31.32 (95% CI: 28.74-33.91). The random pooled annual incidence of TSCI per million was 23.24 (95% CI: 5.64-49.21). Pooled proportion of male gender was 77% (95% CI 73-80%) of the cases. Complete paraplegia was the most common type of injury. Thoracic level injury predominated. Also, the most commonly affected age group was 20-29 then 30-39. Motor vehicle accidents were found to be the leading cause of injury, then falls, gunshot, violence and sports. Further meta-regression analysis showed no association between age and etiology of the injury.
This review shows lack of evidence about SCI in most countries of the MENA region. More epidemiological studies are needed.