How does the spinal cord work? - David Chen, MD

You can think of the spinal cord sort of like telephone cable or like T.V. cable. It’s a structure at its widest is only a quarter in diameter, and its greatest length maybe about a foot, a foot-and-a-half in length. And through it carries all the vital nerves that carry signals from the brain to and from the different parts of the body. So it’s sort of the conduit that carries the signals to the different organs of the body, to the muscles, and the extremities, and the hands and feet. So it’s the important structure that carries the nervous signals to and from the brain.