1. Spatially matching morphometric assessment of cartilage and subchondral bone in osteoarthritic human knee joint with micro-computed tomography
- Author
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Carl Lindahl, Birgitta Gatenholm, Mats Brittberg, and Vincent A. Stadelmann
- Subjects
Cartilage, Articular ,0301 basic medicine ,Histology ,Knee Joint ,Physiology ,Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism ,Contrast Media ,030209 endocrinology & metabolism ,Osteoarthritis ,Bone tissue ,Bone and Bones ,Condyle ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,medicine ,Humans ,Contouring ,Staining and Labeling ,business.industry ,Cartilage ,Reproducibility of Results ,X-Ray Microtomography ,Osteoarthritis, Knee ,Articular cartilage damage ,medicine.disease ,030104 developmental biology ,medicine.anatomical_structure ,Cortical bone ,business ,Biomedical engineering - Abstract
Objective The objective of this study was to develop a reproducible and semi-automatic method based on micro computed tomography (microCT) to analyze cartilage and bone morphology of human osteoarthritic knee joints in spatially matching regions of interest. Materials and methods Tibial plateaus from randomly selected patients with advanced osteoarthritis (OA) who underwent total knee arthroplasty surgery were microCT scanned once fresh and once after staining with Hexabrix. The articular surface was determined manually in the first scan. Total articular surface, defect surface and cartilage surface were computed by triangulation of the cartilage surface and the spatially corresponding subchondral bone regions were automatically generated and the standard cortical bone and trabecular bone morphometric indices were computed. Results The method to identify cartilage surface and defects was successfully validated against photographic examinations. The microCT measurements of the cartilage defect were also verified by conventional histopathology using safranin O–stained sections. Cartilage thickness and volume was significantly lower for OA condyle compared with healthy condyle. Bone fraction, bone tissue mineral density, cortical density and trabecular thickness differed significantly depending on the level of cartilage damage. Conclusion This new microCT imaging workflow can be used for reproducible quantitative evaluation of articular cartilage damage and the associated changes in subchondral bone morphology in osteoarthritic joints with a relatively high throughput compared to manual contouring. This methodology can be applied to gain better understanding of the OA disease progress in large cohorts.
- Published
- 2019