APPEARANCE OF LOW SIGNAL INTENSITY LINES IN MRI OF SILICONE BREAST IMPLANTS

Magnetic resonance (MR) images of five explanted mammary prostheses we re obtained with a 1.5 T GE Signa(R) system using a conventional spin- echo pulse sequence, in order to investigate the low-intensity curvili near lines which may be observed in MR images of silicone gel-filled b reast implants under pressure from fibrous capsules. MR images showed ellipsoid prostheses, often containing multiple low-intensity curvilin ear lines which in some cases presented an appearance very similar to that of the linguine sign. Upon opening the fibrous capsules, however, all of the prostheses were found to be completely intact demonstratin g that the appearance of multiple low signal intensity curvilinear lin es in MR images of silicone gel-filled prostheses is not necessarily a sign of prosthesis rupture. The MR image features which are specific to the linguine sign must be more precisely defined.