The clinical manifestations and MRI characteristics of 58 patients with cervical spondylotic myelopathy were analysed in this study. The results showed that there was myelopathy-hand in 49 patients and none in 9 patients. Two groups were not significantly different in gender, age, course and involved segment, side or level of spinal cord(P > 0.05), but were significantly different in the compression degree of spinal cord(P < 0.01). In the positive group, the degree of myelopathy-hand was positively related to the severity of spastic gait, pyramidal tract sign and spinal cord compression.