Jin Zuo1, Ehsan Saadat1, Adan Romero2, Kimberly Loo3, Thomas Link4, Xiaojuan Li1, Sharmila Majumdar5
1Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA; 2California State Universtiy Monterey Bay; 3Piedmont Hills High School; 4Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco , CA, USA; 5Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA
Intervertebral disc degeneration (IVDD) is a leading cause of lumbar spine-related lower back pain. Clinically, disc degeneration in a patient with lower back pain is diagnosed solely based on morphological techniques. Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy (MRS) is a non-invasive spectroscopic technique that delivers a biochemical and metabolic representation of the tissue in addition to the anatomic information classically derived from MRI. The goal of this study was to investigate the correlation between biochemical assays of the intervertebral disc of cadaveric spine specimens and bovine specimens with the MRS findings.