Volume‐selective proton MRS in vertebral bodies

Abstract

Volume-selective 1H magnetic resonance spectra of small volume elements of (13 mm)3 positioned in lumbar vertebral bodies have been investigated in 15 healthy persons of different ages and sexes and in 11 patients with leukemia using double spin-echo sequences. Signal intensities and positions of the spectral lines have been evaluated. Interindividual spectra of VOI located in the center of vertebral bodies, intraindividual spectra of central VOI in different vertebral bodies, and spectra of different localizations within the same vertebral body have been compared as well as spectra before and partly after cytostatic treatment in leukemia patients. Unexpected phenomena of the signal shapes have been found. The water signal distributions in healthy persons compared to patients after bone marrow transplantation show significant differences. The success of the cytostatic treatment in cases of leukemia is accompanied by an increase in the intensity of the lipid signals and a decrease in the water signals.

Correlation between the bone marrow blood perfusion and lipid water content on the lumbar spine in female subjects

“…The LW by measuring the full-width at half-maximum of each signal is commonly presented in Hertz (10). LW was influenced by magnetic field inhomogeneities, which stem from bone trabeculae (22,23).…”

“…If the L3 vertebra was collapsed or otherwise altered in structure, a neighboring vertebra (L2) was used. The 1 H stimulated echo-acquisition mode (STEAM) sequence was used as described (10,20). A cubic voxel for spectral measurement was placed at third lumbar vertebral body ( Fig.…”

Proton MR spectroscopy of the femoral head—Evaluation of patients at risk for avascular necrosis

“…1b) using single voxel spectroscopy (SVS) with a stimulated echo-acquisition mode (STEAM) sequence for three-dimensional localization of the sample volume (the proton MRS STEAM sequence has been described elsewhere (15,19)). Automatic global shimming was performed prior to acquisition by an automated algorithm.…”

“…Proton MRS techniques have been developed and used to measure the musculoskeletal and fat tissue in vivo (13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18). In 1995, Bluemke et al (13) measured fat content (as a percentage) in the femoral head by using MRS on patients with systemic lupus erythematosus, long-term corticosteroid treatment patients, and healthy subjects.…”

“…Ballon et al (14) used a volume-localized MRS technique to estimate bone marrow cellularity and found that the results correlated with the results from marrow-core biopsies. Shick et al (15,18) measured MRS from the vertebral bodies and compared the water signal distributions from healthy people and patients after bone marrow transplantation, and found a relative difference between the two. In 1997 Amano and Kumazaki (16) performed MRS using a stimulated echo acquisition mode (STEAM) technique to demonstrate a significant difference in the marrow water to fat ratio between patients with aplastic anemia and healthy subjects.…”