Hey again.
I am having a repeat brain MRI this week to include contrast and cervical spine. Is it usual to only MRI the cervical part of the spine and not the whole of it please?
Depends where your symptoms are manifesting. Cranial + Cervical will cover your head and neck / shoulders / arms. Thoracic will cover nerves going to legs. For MS, in spite of pain & loss of mobility in legs & hips (if applicable), a lumbar MRI is often not needed.
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Yes, seems to be the case in the UK. Those with lesions in the thoracic region most usually have them in the cervical area as well. Also it is much harder to get a clear MRI of the thoracic region, apparently, due to movement creating a lot of artifacts (from breathing) and due to the small area of the spinal cord.
They can save time (and money) by missing out scanning the thoracic region. Those with lesions only in the thoracic region of course will be missed.
Out of curiosity, did they do some sort of exam before ordering the MRI? When I had my first MRI, first the neuro did a really thorough examination looking at where I had sensation all over my body, my reflexes and various muscle and walking tests, eye tests and so forth. Then based on my symptoms he decided to do brain and cervical spine. If you search on Google images or similar something like ‘spine injury symptoms’ or… I seem to recall I actually found the thing I’m suggesting you find using the search term ‘C4 spinal lesion’ (although obviously that exact term wouldn’t seem applicable to you); you should get a bunch of diagrams showing the spine and neck and down to the lumbar regions and they’ll show what symptoms injuries or lesions on different parts of the cord cause. When I saw it, suddenly it made perfect sense why my neurologist had asked for a scan of my cervical spine - because my symptoms matched those caused by damage in that area - and it also made sense that that was one of the places they found lesions.
Hi anna, yes I think your neuro must suspect that’s where your lesions could be.
Mine took some finding…years…none in my brain…they are on my cervical and thoracic spine.
Boudsx
Well I survived 1 hour 10 mins in the MRI machine today for brain and spine with contrast . I was pleased that they scanned the whole spine so no stone left unturned.
I was proud with how I coped , counted the bangs and made songs from the beat!
Now the waiting game !
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