Spinal Cord White Matter Integrity in Patients with Cervical Spondylosis Is Related to Severity of Spinal Canal Stenosis: A Combined MRI and Diffusion Tensor Imaging Study

Antoine Feydy¹, Pavel Lindberg¹, Francois Rannou², Jean-Luc Drape¹, Marc A. Maier³

We used DTI to test if the severity of spinal canal stenosis is related to the degree of spinal white matter integrity in patients with cervical spondylosis. Patients and controls were studied with DTI of cervical spinal cord. The patients had lower FA than controls and increased spinal canal stenosis. The mean degree of spinal canal stenosis correlated with mean FA, i.e., patients with least cervical canal space had lowest FA values of the whole cervical spinal cord. The results show that DTI can quantify spinal cord white matter degeneration related to spinal canal stenosis in patients with cervical spondylosis.