Spinal deformities have a long history that scientifically begins in Hippocrates time even though descriptions of people with curved backs can be found in many previous documents: the Old Testament (200-300 years before the Father of Medicine birth), old Chinese, Indian and Egyptians documents (more than 2000 years before the contributions of the Greeks and the Jews), and an image that goes back to the Stone Age (this shows a congenital scoliosis due to a hemivertebrae). Therefore it is evident that the spine deformities have followed mankind since his evolution into an upright being and, furthermore, great importance has always been attributed to all the problems related with this pathology.

Attempts to explain spinal deformity aetiology (in particular scoliosis), to evaluate the possible progression of the disease, to individualise the right therapeutic treatment have been without significant improvement for centuries. Biblical references implicated that for spinal deformities no treatment was possible. Hippocrates, in his famous treaty “ΠEPI’ APΘPΩN”, after a classification of curves and angular deformities, described the first procedure of deformity reduction. One millennium later, Paolo from Egina tried a gradual correction of scoliosis using cast bandages. On the XVI century, Ambroise Paré taught how to fabricate metal cuirass to be applied on the scoliotic trunk.

Since then no more substantial progress has been made, especially as it concerns aetiology, until our century when the three dimensional characteristics of the scoliotic deformities have been pointed out, the first spinal arthrodesis made and the Milwaukee brace used. Constant progress of electronic technology and informatics, together with a good specialisation on surgical techniques and bio-compatible materials, have made possible today the realisation of researches more accurate both on the etiologic side and on prevention and treatment.

Specific three dimensional measurement techniques, based on optical or opto-electronic principles of image capture, can in fact provide a complete set of results to quantify, without any risk for the patient, the morphological/functional state of the spine and the effects induced by various spinal diseases on the whole postural performance.

This volume, including the contributions of the most authoritative researchers in the field, is the end product of the 2nd International Symposium on Three Dimensional Scoliotic Deformities combined with the 8th International Symposium on Surface Topography and Spinal Deformity held on September 1994 in Pescara (Italy). The book covers topics such as 3-D acquisition-reconstruction-modelling techniques, 3-D biomechanical analysis, 3-D etiologic and prognostic aspects, 3-D treatment of scoliosis, surface topography and internal 3-D spinal and/or trunk anatomy.

M. D’Amico, A. Merolli, G.C. Santambrogio (Editors)

December 1994