T1rho Imaging Quantification of Early Intervertebral Disc Degeneration in Pilots on 3.0T Magnetic Resonance

Degenerative disc disease is an occupational disease of the military pilots, which seriously influcenes their health and normal training. Early disc degeneration begins with changes in biochemical compositions which is mainly characterized by proteoglycan lose and cannot be detected on conventional MRI imaging^[1-2]. T1rho is a quantitative imaging technique to reflect changes in the extracellular matrix, such as modifications in the intervertebral disc PG content^[3]. In this study，Bivariate correlation analysis was performed to compare T1rho values to the degenerative grade, disc space level, age and flight time of the pilots. T1rho values of Lumbar intervertebral discs in pilots demonstrated significantly negative correlations with degenerative grade, age and flight time, except for disk space levels. T1rho can be potentially used as a valid clinical method in the quantitative diagnosis of early intervertebral disc degeneration in asymptomatic Pilots.