Functional and Weight Bearing lumbar MRIs

[Disciple]

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I'm an interventional pain doc, so I routinely order L-spine MRIs.

On occasion, I've had patient's come in with reports from "functional and/or "weight-bearing" MRIs.

I'm not familiar with the medical literature on these, but know that they are not common place.

Any experienced Radiologists care to comment on the validity or lack-there-of of these MRIs?


Thanks.

 

[f_w]

There are two ways of doing a weight-bearing MRI. One is to tilt the MRI scanner upright:

http://www.fonar.com/standup.htm

The other way is to use a compression contraption like this:

http://www.dynawell.biz/

No doubt, you will find more bulging/protruding/extruding discs if you image the spine either upright or under compression. What to my knowledge hasn't been shown is whether acting on those findings does the patient any good (the big confounder here is the high rate of FBS).

So, if you derive your income from doing surgery on spines, buying one of those upright scanners makes business sense. I will gladly be convinced otherwise, but so far I am not sure that they are actually for the good of mankind.