gms | German Medical Science

63rd Annual Meeting of the German Society of Neurosurgery (DGNC)
Joint Meeting with the Japanese Neurosurgical Society (JNS)

German Society of Neurosurgery (DGNC)

13 - 16 June 2012, Leipzig

3T kinematic MRI of the cervical spine for evaluation of adjacent level diseases after cervical disc arthroplasty: Preliminary results

Meeting Abstract

  • S. Fleck - Klinik und Poliklinik für Neurochirurgie, Universitätsklinikum Greifswald, Deutschland
  • S. Langner - Institut für Radiologie und Neuroradiologie, Universitätsklinikum Greifswald, Deutschland
  • R. Seipel - Institut für Radiologie und Neuroradiologie, Universitätsklinikum Greifswald, Deutschland
  • C. Rosenstengel - Klinik und Poliklinik für Neurochirurgie, Universitätsklinikum Greifswald, Deutschland
  • J. Baldauf - Klinik und Poliklinik für Neurochirurgie, Universitätsklinikum Greifswald, Deutschland
  • H.W.S. Schroeder - Klinik und Poliklinik für Neurochirurgie, Universitätsklinikum Greifswald, Deutschland

Deutsche Gesellschaft für Neurochirurgie. Japanische Gesellschaft für Neurochirurgie. 63. Jahrestagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Neurochirurgie (DGNC), Joint Meeting mit der Japanischen Gesellschaft für Neurochirurgie (JNS). Leipzig, 13.-16.06.2012. Düsseldorf: German Medical Science GMS Publishing House; 2012. DocDO.12.06

doi: 10.3205/12dgnc111, urn:nbn:de:0183-12dgnc1114

Published: June 4, 2012

© 2012 Fleck et al.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/deed.en). You are free: to Share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work, provided the original author and source are credited.


Outline

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Objective: We prospectively evaluated the signal intensity (SI) of adjacent disc spaces before and after cervical disc arthroplasty using 3T kinematic MRI studies to further understand structural alterations after cervical spine operations.

Methods: 32 patients underwent a cervical disc arthroplasty (Bryan®, Medtronic) (17 females, 15 males; age range 18 to 50). Until now, 18 subjects were analysed pre -and postoperatively after 6 months with 3 T MRI (T2-weighted) (Magnetom Verio, SIEMENS) with flexible 4-channel coil. The cervical spine was positioned (flexion, extension, neutral position) using positioning pillows. T2 3D-SPACE and T2 TSE sequences were taken, and axial views were reconstructed. We focused on signal intensity changes of all non-operated disc levels to reveal developing adjacent level diseases. The signal intensity (SI) with respect to fat tissue of 198 discs was analysed using ROI analysis (Osirix®). The Mann-Whitney test was used for statistical analyses (PASW®,vers.18).

Results: The differences of pre- and postoperative SI of all non-operated disc spaces were not statistically significant (p = 0.562). Furthermore, we found no statistical significant changes of SI in the adjacent disc levels above (p = 0.297) and below the operated level (p = 0.817) 6 months after operation. In addition, we found a strong correlation between range of motion (ROM) in functional plain radiographs and in MRI, with no statistical difference.

Conclusions: Our study was able to demonstrate the feasibility of a kinematic study of the cervical spine in a wide-bore 3 T MRI. The results show the absence of degenerative changes in adjacent levels after cervical disc arthroplasty at least 6 months after operation.