Taking inspiration from an interesting paper – Advances in Musculoskeletal MRI – Technical Considerations – I was asking myself: how many Tesla are needed to make a correct diagnosis of knee pathology? Recent MRI technology developments have brought new powerful systems; some radiology departments start using 3 Tesla Mri imaging systems for knee exams. But what is the real added value on musculoskeletal imaging? Not considering special techniques like spectroscopy or molecular imaging, what can I see more than a dedicated system does not reveal? I often wondered if my report would change by scanning the same patient with a 3 Tesla Mri. Three days ago a man came to my department bringing a previous 3 Tesla Mri exam: what a nice chance to reveal if there was any difference! Take a look at the comparison between 0.3, 1.5 and 3 Tesla images of the same patient; history of patellar fracture, femoro-patellar chondropathy and posterior horn medial meniscus tear. High field Mri for knee evaluation: is it always needed?
