Simultaneous MR neurography and apparent T2 mapping of cervical nerve roots before microendoscopic surgery to treat patient with radiculopathy due to cervical disc herniation: Preliminary results

There is no imaging modality to quantitatively evaluate compressed cervical nerve roots in cervical radiculopathy. Here we sought to evaluate the usefulness of simultaneous apparent T2 mapping and neurography with nerve-sheath signal increased with inked rest-tissue rapid acquisition of relaxation-enhancement imaging (SHINKEI-Quant) to evaluate compressed nerves quantitatively in patients with cervical radiculopathy due to cervical disc hernia before microendoscopic surgery. One patient with cervical radiculopathy due to cervical disc hernia before microendoscopic surgery and 5 healthy subjects underwent simultaneous apparent T2 mapping and neurography with SHINKEI-Quant. The patient was a 49-year-old man with severe right upper arm pain and numbness. Based on MRI images, we suspected right C7 radiculopathy due to C6-7 cervical disc hernia. The T2 relaxation times of the cervical dorsal root ganglia of the brachial plexus bilaterally at C5-C8 were measured. We observed no significant differences in T2 relaxation times between the nerve roots on the left and right at each spinal level with values in healthy subjects. In our patient, neurography revealed swelling of the right C7 nerve, and a prolonged T2 relaxation time compared with that of the contralateral, unaffected C7 nerve. We performed microendoscopic surgery and the symptoms improved. We were able to evaluate the injured nerve root quantitatively in a patient with cervical radiculopathy using the SHINKEI-Quant technique, being the first study to our knowledge to show the usefulness of this technique to evaluate cervical radiculopathy quantitatively before microendoscopic surgery.