MR imaging of the peripheral nervous system

✍ Scribed by W. Scott Enochs; Ralph Weissleder

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1994
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 1013 KB
• Volume: 4
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1053-1807
• DOI: 10.1002/jmri.1880040306

✦ Synopsis

MAGNETIC RESONANCE (MR) imaging has become the modality of choice for evaluating the peripheral nervous system (PNS), since MR imaging has shown a high sensitivity for detecting a variety of mechanical (compression and entrapment), inflammatory, neoplastic, and traumatic lesions. The sensitivity of MR imaging in many of these disorders is increased by intravenous administration of paramagnetic chelates such as gadopentetate dimeglumine. Recently, techniques based on diffusion or very heavy T2 weighting have been described for imaging peripheral nerves selectively. Neuronal function also has been demonstrated recently in experimental studies by using intraneural injection of superparamagnetic iron oxide compounds that exhibit slow axonal transport. In the future, selective imaging of nerves (neurography) coupled with targeted (neurotropic) contrast agents may show not only morphologic but also early functional abnormalities of peripheral nerves.

CONVENTIONAL IMAGING TECHNIQUES

MR Imaging versus CT

MR imaging offers distinct advantages over computed tomography (CT) in studying the PNS in certain anatomic regions. One such region is the skull base, where the lack of bone artifacts on MR images permits visualization of the cranial nerves ( 1.2). Other regions are the spinal and paraspinal areas, where the multiplanar capability of MR imaging allows visualization of the spinal nerve roots as they form from rootlets in Index terms: Contrast media * Nerves. peripheral Nervous system. MR