Y. Morio et al., DOES INCREASED SIGNAL INTENSITY OF THE SPINAL-CORD ON MR-IMAGES DUE TO CERVICAL MYELOPATHY PREDICT PROGNOSIS, Archives of orthopaedic and trauma surgery, 113(5), 1994, pp. 254-259
We examined whether or not high signal intensity change on magnetic re
sonance imaging of the spinal cord of patients with cervical myelopath
y is related to the clinical symptoms and prognosis. Twenty-five patie
nts with cervical myelopathy were treated by decompressive surgery whi
ch involved laminoplasty or decompressive anterior interbody fusion. T
he pathological conditions were cervical disc herniation (n = 8), ossi
fication of the posterior longitudinal ligament in the cervical spine
(n = 7), and cervical spondylotic myelopathy (n = 10). The spinal cord
compression and the intramedullary signal intensity at the site of ma
ximum compression were evaluated pre- and postoperatively using T1- an
d T2-weighted images. There was no significant relationship between sp
inal cord compressive change and clinical symptoms. Patients in whom t
he high signal change of the spinal cord on T2-weighted sequence recov
ered after decompressive surgery had better recovery from clinical sym
ptoms, but a statistical significance was not found. We suggest that s
ignal changes on T2-weighted images may reflect pathological changes b
ut cannot be used to predict prognosis at present.