ABSTRACT
Objective To investigate the imaging feature of hippocampal sclerosis (HS), and evaluate the diagnostic value of double inversion recovery (DIR) sequence at 3.0 T MR for its diagnosis. Methods Twelve patients with unilateral HS proven by pathology and 12 healthy volunteers were enrolled. All patients received DIR, fluid attenuated inversion recovery (FLAIR) and T2 TSE sequences scans on oblique coronal plane vertical to the hippocampal axis on a 3.0 T MR scanner. Regions of interest (ROI) were set respectively in ipsilateral and contralateral hippocampi hippocampi in patients with HS, and the bilateral hippocampi in healthy volunteneers were placed respectively. Signal to noise ratio (SNR), contrast to noise ratio (CNR), ratio of signal intensity (RSI) and asymmetry index (AI) of each ROI in all hippocampi were calculated and compared among the three sequences. Statistical analysis was performed with one-way ANOVA. Results On DIR images, ipsilateral hippocampal lesions demonstrated extremely high signal intensity. Relative signal intensity of ipsilateral hippocampal lesions, contralateral hippocampi and the hippocampi in control groups healthy volunteneers were 1.50±0.05, 1.26±0.03, 1.18±0.05 (F=172.609,P=0.000), respectively. SNR of ipsilateral hippocampal lesions on DIR, FLAIR and T2 TSE sequences were 84.13±16.62, 50.90±12.38, 63.25±15.46 (F=15.185,P=0.000), respectively. CNR of hippocampus were 13.72±3.73, 6.67±3.02, 7.33±3.65 (F=14.985,P=0.000), respectively.In HS patients, RSI and AI of the ipsilateral hippocampal lesions and contralateral hippocampi among the three sequences did not show statistically significant difference(P=0.078). Conclusions HS manifests extremely high signal intensity on DIR images. On DIR images, the SNR and CNR of HS were higher than those on conventional MR sequences which provide valuable information for the diagnosis of HS.