Humans typically have one spinal cord.
While the spinal cord has segments and branching nerves, it is a single, continuous structure. The reference clarifies that:
- The spinal cord divides into 31 segments: cervical 8, thoracic 12, lumbar 5, sacral 5, and coccygeal 1.
- These segments consist of 31 pairs of spinal nerves with their respective spinal root ganglia.
- Spinal nerves contain the motor, sensory, and autonomic fibers.
This segmentation refers to the organization of nerves branching off the single spinal cord, not to multiple spinal cords. Each segment corresponds to a pair of spinal nerves, which exit the vertebral column through the intervertebral foramen.
