2 – 5% of severely traumatically injured patients have cervical spinal fractures and 1 – 2% of those will have an unstable cervical fracture. Furthermore, it is estimated that somewhere between 3 and 25% of injury to the spinal cord does not actually happen at the time of the traumatic incident, but rather during medical management of the patient following trauma. To reduce the incidence of these spinal cord injuries, a variety of techniques have been introduced to reduce trauma to the spinal cord during patient management.Some of these techniques include the use of backboards, cervical collars and log-rolling techniques.The use of backboards and cervical collars has been in place since the 1960s and were not necessarily based on research but rather anecdotally introduced. In the past decade, the use of some of these spinal protective techniques has been called into question and current research indicates that not only may they not be useful; some can actually cause the patient further harm. This session will look at current strategies commonly employed to protect the spinal cord after trauma including the use of backboards, cervical collars and log-rolling to determine if they are effective or not. Alternatives to these strategies will be discussed.