%0 Journal Article
%T Conventional radiography requires a MRI-estimated bone volume loss of 20% to 30% to allow certain detection of bone erosions in rheumatoid arthritis metacarpophalangeal joints
%A Bo Jannik Ejbjerg
%A Aage Vestergaard
%A S£¿ren Jacobsen
%A Henrik Thomsen
%A Mikkel £¿stergaard
%J Arthritis Research & Therapy
%D 2006
%I BioMed Central
%R 10.1186/ar1919
%X Conventional radiography offers information about destructive joint changes and has been the mainstay in diagnostic imaging in inflammatory arthropathies for decades. Radiographic erosion and/or periarticular osteopenia is one of the American College of Rheumatology 1987 revised criteria for the classification of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) [1]. Conventional radiography is the recommended method for monitoring progression of structural joint changes in the routine management of RA patients as well as in clinical trials [2].It has a lower sensitivity than MRI for bone erosions [3], although the relative difference, that is, how large MRI erosions need to be before they are detectable on conventional radiography, is not known.The objective of this study was, with MRI as the standard reference, to demonstrate the ability of conventional radiography to detect bone erosions of different sizes in RA metacarpophalangeal (MCP) joints.Sixty-nine rheumatoid arthritis patients, 57 female and 12 male, fulfilling the American College of Rheumatology 1987 revised diagnostic criteria [1] were enrolled in the study. The median age and disease duration was 51 years (24 to 85 years) and 5 years (2 months to 37 years), respectively. Seventy-three percent of the patients were IgM rheumatoid factor positive. Local ethics committee approval was obtained prior to study initiation, and signed informed consent was obtained from all patients.MRI of the 2nd to 5th MCP joints was performed on a 0.2 Tesla dedicated extremity MRI unit (Artoscan, Esaote Biomedica, Genova, Italy) equipped with a dual phased array wrist coil. All MRI examinations were carried out using a T1 weighted three-dimensional gradient echo sequence with subsequent multiplanar reconstruction. The scanning parameters were: repetition time 30 ms, echo time 12 ms, slice thickness 1 mm, field of view 140 mm ¡Á 140 mm ¡Á 80 mm, matrix 192 ¡Á 160 ¡Á 80, number of acquisitions 1, flip angle 65¡ã, voxel size 0.54 ¡Á 0.54, scanning time 6.25
%U http://arthritis-research.com/content/8/3/R59