Quantitative muscle MRI (T2&fat mapping) is progressively more used to assess disease involvement in muscle disorders, but in a static way, with dynamic assessment usually performed by clinical and instrumental examinations. To characterize muscle deformation we applied dynamic MRI synchronized with neuromuscular electrical stimulation evaluating the quadriceps muscles in 34 ambulatory subjects affected by facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) and ten healthy controls, longitudinally. Maximum values and rates of the strain differed between the two groups. Our results suggest that the evaluation of muscle ability to contract could be potentially used to monitor the evolution of muscle involvement in FSHD.
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