Repeatability of patellar cartilage thickness patterns in the living, using a fat-suppressed magnetic resonance imaging sequence with short acquisition time and three-dimensinal data processing

A fast, reproducible, and noninvasive method is required for quantifying cartilage thickness clinically and for studying the deformation of articular cartilage during and after mechanical loading in vivo. The objective of the current investigation was to test the repeatability of regional distribution patterns of patellar cartilage thickness in the living on the basis of a fat-suppressed magnetic resonance imaging sequence with a short acquisition time and three-dimensional digital data processing. The knees of eight healthy volunteers were transversally imaged with a fat-suppressed FLASH-3D (fast low angle shot) sequence (acquisition time: 4 minutes and 10 seconds). In each case, the joint…