Straight-back syndrome. A case report and review of the literature

This is a case report of an unusual clinical entity-the Straight Back Syndrome (SBS), in a two and a half (2 1/2) year old cerebral palsied Ghanalan male child. It was an incidental finding in which his lateral x-ray of the chest revealed a straight thoracic spine, devoid of the normal thoracic concavity. Organic heart disease was excluded by his normal electrocardiogram (EGG) and echocardiogram. Review of the literature shows that whereas in the sixties, this syndrome bore no associations with structural heart diseases, in the nineties, there have been significant organic heart defects described as its associates. The reports are however, silent on any association between cerebral palsy and the straight back syndrome.