Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the lumbar spine with dedicated G-scan machine in the upright position: a retrospective study and our experience in 10 years with 4305 patients

Abstract

The G-scan is useful to assess instability of the lumbar spine detecting hidden modifications of protrusions and/or herniated discs already present in the supine position. It is also helpful in assessing the presence or modification of spondylolisthesis and lumbar canal stenosis.

Dynamic MR in patients affected by neurogenical claudication: technique and results from a single-center experience

“…Splendiani et al [1] found in a large sample of patients significant differences in the evaluation of degenerative aspects analyzed with dynamic MR in the transition from standing to supine position; in particular, the appearance of disc protrusions was significantly detected in 11 % of the cases, as well as the increase or appearance of spinal canal stenosis in 9.2 % of the cases; these data are in agreement with other previous published studies [9,24,25] performed with open dynamic MR magnets.…”

“…In many cases, dynamic MR has proven [1,9,13,24,25] to reveal disc-radicular conflicts not depictable on conventional MR studies.…”

“…Low back pain with or without sciatica is one of the most common medical problems in the Western world [1]. Magnetic resonance (MR) is widely employed to evaluate various diseases of the lumbar spine, responsible for neurological claudication.…”

“…Magnetic resonance (MR) is widely employed to evaluate various diseases of the lumbar spine, responsible for neurological claudication. Since the conventional MR examinations of the spine usually are performed in supine position and so in functional rest, the loading conditions differ from those known to elicit symptoms in patients affected by lumbar canal stenosis; indeed, this is frequently exacerbated by upright standing and hidden in the supine position [1,2].…”

“…For this reason, different techniques [1,[3][4][5][6][7][8][9] have been developed to overcome this issue in order to study the column under loading conditions; thanks to its peculiarity in recognizing soft tissue pathologies entailing articular structures and nerve roots, great interest emerged in the last two decades on new MR scanners able to perform dynamic acquisitions in upright position.…”