Railway spine

Railway spine was a nineteenth-century diagnosis for the post-traumatic symptoms of passengers involved in railroad accidents.

The first full length medical study of the condition was John Eric Erichsen's On Railway and Other Injuries of the Nervous System, published in 1864. For this reason, railway spine is often known as "Erichsen's disease".

Many physicians thought that the symptoms were due to the "excessive speeds" (about 30 mph) of the trains, and that the human body could not cope with speeds that fast. It was later found to be purely psychological in origin, and no longer exists as a valid disorder.

The nature of symptoms caused by "railway spine" was hotly debated in the late 19th century. German physicians claimed that all railway spine symptoms were due to physical damage to the spine or brain, whereas French and American scholars, notably Charcot, insisted that some sympotms could be caused by hysteria.