In total, 64 articles from PubMed and Embase were screened. Of the 64 articles, 27 met inclusion criteria. Of the 27 articles reviewed, 19/27 were case reports or reviews of surfer’s myelopathy. The next most common reported surfing related neurological complication was cervical spine trauma in 5/27 manuscripts. Other neurological injuries reported included common peroneal neuropathy (1/27), post traumatic headache (1/27), and thoracic/lumbar injury (1/27). With EMR data collection, 601 patients were identified, and 73 patients had neurological diagnosis/diagnoses associated with surfing. Diagnoses were: lumbar/thoracic nerve vertebrae damage (n=51), cervical spine trauma/injury (n=17), post-traumatic headache n=13, and peroneal neuropathy (n=10 or fewer).

The most commonly reported surfing related neurological complications in the literature review are surfer’s myelopathy and cervical spine injury. These findings are corroborated by a retrospective EMR review. Work is in progress to further characterize neurologic complications of surfing including different surfing modalities and investigate potential curative and preventive interventions.