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The value of quantitative diffusion tensor imaging indices of spinal cord disorders

Research Authors
Mohammad Koriem Mahmoud Omar, Abd El‑Karem Hasan Abd Allah, Mona Gouda Maghrabi and Mohamed Zidan Mohamed
Research Date
Research Journal
Egyptian journal of radiology and nuclear medicine
Research Abstract

Background: Different lesions affecting the spinal cord can lead to myelopathy. Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) is widely used to predict the degree of spinal cord microstructure affection and to assess axonal integrity and diffusion directionality. We hypothesized that not all DTI parameters have the same affection with different spinal cord patholo‑ gies. The purpose of this study is to assess the value of the quantitative diffusion tensor imaging indices in different spinal cord lesions. Results: There is highly statistically significant difference of the fractional anisotropy (FA), relative anisotropy (RA), vol‑ ume ratio (VR) and secondary eigenvector values (E2 and E3) between various studied cord lesions and control levels. There is no statistically significant difference of the apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) and the primary eigenvector value (E1) (ANOVA test). The ROC curve analysis showed the higher sensitivity and accuracy were ‘88% and 62.5%, respectively,’ with FA cutoff value about 0.380. Conclusion: The resulted quantitative DTI indices ‘fractional anisotropy, relative anisotropy, volume ratio and second‑ ary eigenvalues’ work as a numerical in vivo marker of overall tissue injury in different pathologies affecting the spinal cord. Keywords: MRI, Diffusion tensor imaging, FA, ADC, VR, RA, Eigenvector values, Myelopathy