ABSTRACT
-Bone marrow imaging has been greatly advanced with magnetic resonance (MR) imaging.
Bone marrow contains fat and nonfat cells, which makes imaging with MR imaging the
modality of choice, particularly within the spine. Any alteration within the marrow
makeup is usually well seen with different MR imaging sequences. Conventional spin-echo
sequences are helpful because of their great signal-to-noise ratio, and anatomic detail.
Other, newer sequences-such as short T1 inversion recovery (STIR), diffusion weighted,
fat suppression techniques; as well as in- and opposed-phase images-may also help
to increase detection of or characterize certain diseases of the bone marrow within
the spine. This article deals with the different imaging sequences available to radiologists
when imaging the spinal bone marrow.
KEYWORD
Bone marrow - spine, MR - hematopoietic disease
