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Abstract #0134

Morphological and Quantitative Evaluation of Meniscal Calcifications by Novel 2D IR and 3D UTE MR Techniques

Patrick Omoumi1,2, Eric S. Diaz1, Jiang Du1, Sheronda S. Statum1, Won C. Bae1, Graeme Bydder1, Christine B. Chung1

1University of California, San Diego, San Diego, CA, United States; 2Cliniques Universitaire St Luc, Brussels, Belgium


Meniscal calcifications are frequent and likely alter the normal biomechanics of the meniscus. Although MR imaging is the non-invasive technique of choice for the evaluation of meniscal pathology, it does not allow the facile visualization of meniscal calcifications. This is due to a lack of contrast (both calcifications and menisci have relatively short T2 relaxation times), and a lack of saptial rsolution with standard clinical sequences. We describe novel MR imaging techniques based on 2D-UTE inversion recovery and 3D-UTE data acquisition to address these factors. We assessed the ability of these sequences to allow the visualization, characterization and quantitative evaluation of meniscal calcifications.