The clinical value of MRI in the diagnosis of Wallerian degeneration

WANG Dong

Abstract：Objective To explore the value of conventional MRI in the diagnosis of Wallerian degeneration of pyramidal tract after brain damage.Methods 69 patients with Wallerian degeneration of pyramidal tract after brain damage were subjected to MRI.MRI was regularly performed with fast spin echo sequence ( FSE conventional transection, sagittal and coronary scanning) by use of the following parameters:1.5T:T1WI FSE (TR 550 ms TE 15 ms) T2WI FSE (TR 2 800 ms TE 131 ms) 0.5T:T1WI SE(TR 500 ms,TE 15 ms);T2WI FSE(TR 3 000 ms, TE 130 ms), with a layer thick of 5 mm and a layer space of 1.0 cm.Re-sults In 69 patients with Wallerian, the time between the brain damage occurrence and inspection ranged from 5 weeks to 3 years, in which 4~5 weeks were recorded in 2 cases, 5 weeks-12 months in 60 cases, more than 12 months in 7 cases.The ab-normal signals via the corona radiate passed through the internal capsule, and ( or) the posterior limb of the internal capsule, the lateral sulcus of crus cerebri and basilar part of pons to medullary pyramid and, in addition, those signals more than three layers can be observed.Conventional MRI strip abnormal signal exhibited a little bit long T1 signal, long T2 signal in 2 cases.Patchy T2 FLARI sequence exhibited slightly high signal.Abnormal stripe signal for long T1 long T2 signal exhibited in 67 cases.12 cases were found the lesion side of the brain stem was atrophy, where lateral pedunculus cerebri of midbrain was more remarkable.Con-clusion MRI can clearly show the Wallerian degeneration of pyramidal tract after brain damage, which could help clinicians rightly evaluate the prognosis of patients and make treatment plan for the rehabilitation of movement function.