Abstract #5054

Sodium Imaging of Untreated Cartilage Lesions in the Knee Joint: 3-months and 6-months Follow-up Study at 7T

Stefan Zbyn^1,2,3, Markus Schreiner⁴, Vladimir Mlynarik¹, Vladimir Juras¹, Pavol Szomolanyi¹, Didier Laurent⁵, Celeste Scotti⁵, Harry Haber⁵, Joerg Goldhahn⁵, Ewa Kubiak⁵, Xeni Deligianni⁶, Oliver Bieri⁶, Stefan Marlovits⁷, Miika T. Nieminen^2,8,9, and Siegfried Trattnig^1,3

¹High Field MR Center, Department of Biomedical Imaging and Image-Guided Therapy, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria, ²Research Unit of Medical Imaging, Physics and Technology, University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland, ³CD Laboratory for Clinical Molecular MR Imaging, Vienna, Austria, ⁴Department of Orthopaedics, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria, ⁵Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research, Basel, Switzerland, ⁶Division of Radiological Physics, Department of Radiology, University of Basel Hospital, Basel, Switzerland, ⁷Department of Traumatology, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria, ⁸Medical Research Center, University of Oulu and Oulu University Hospital, Oulu, Finland, ⁹Department of Diagnostic Radiology, Oulu University Hospital, Oulu, Finland

Sodium MRI was used for the follow-up of patients with cartilage lesions at 7T. MRI was obtained at baseline, 8-days, 3-months and 6-months follow-up. Regions-of-interest evaluations were performed in weight-bearing, non-weight-bearing and lesion area of femoral cartilage. Sodium values were significantly lower in lesion than in weight-bearing and non-weight-bearing regions at all follow-up measurements. On the other hand, weight-bearing and non-weight-bearing cartilage regions showed stable sodium values over the follow-up time. Sodium imaging allows noninvasive in vivo monitoring of changes in cartilage GAG content and thus can be useful for the evaluation of cartilage degeneration or cartilage regenerating therapies.

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