MRI lingo

[KalikaLily]

Sooo doc is sending me for more MRIs (only a few months after my first.... Eek!)
I am getting the brain with and without contrast (which means one without the dye, then one with) and them my cspine....
What exactly is my Cspine??? And are there different types of spine MRIs!!??
I am getting so lost!!! I got SIX specialist letters in the mail just today (one of them not for me mind you :P) and I'm goin loopy!!

[MrsBones]

C spine is the cervical spine...your neck. This is the second most common area of the CNS for lesions to show in MS, after the brain. The third is the thoracic area of the spinal cord, which is from where the neck meets the torso to the upper lower back, if that makes sense. About the bottom of the ribs.

The lumbar spine is the lower back, but isn't really too relevant to MS as the spinal cord proper ends approximately at the low thoracic, again, around the lowest ribs, and branches out into a bundle of nerves called the cauda equina. I have heard, though, of people who developed a lesion at the very end of the spinal cord.

Some folks have lesions show in the spine first or have more in the spine than brain. It's possible you had some there before the one(s) in your brain were found. It's not a bad idea to see what's going on in there,too. Especially if you have any symptoms that point to a spinal lesion.

Be warned, though. You'll be shootin' the tube for a while doing c-spine as well as brain. Best to talk to your dr if you think it will be an issue for you.

[Redwings]

Welcome back, MrsBones!

And are there different types of spine MRIs!!??

Hi KalikaLily:
Not types, but different areas of the spine that are looked at in a scan. As MrsBones explained, the spinal column is anatomically divided into three sections: cervical, thoracic and lumbar. The MRI lingo for those areas goes all the way back to the early days of X-rays.

The cervical spine (the bones) and spinal cord are important in general because the nervous supply for the arms, torso and legs passes through the area on the way to/from the brain. In cases of trauma, the area is often X-rayed to evaluate for a bony injury that could or has damaged the spinal cord, discs and/or spinal nerves and could impair function in the body. On medical shows you might have heard doctors in the ER holler, "Gimme a C-spine!" They're calling for an X-ray of the cervical (upper) spine. The other sections are abbreviated T-spine and L-spine. With new technology, the lingo carried over to MRI scans.