General Obstetrics and Gynecology: GynecologyA structured system to evaluate urethral support anatomy in magnetic resonance images☆,☆☆
Section snippets
Methods
Fifty nulliparous women were recruited for an Institutional Review Board–approved case-control study that concerned vaginal delivery and stress urinary incontinence. After the women gave informed consent, multiplanar 2-dimensional fast spin (echo time, 15 ms; repetition time, 4000 ms) proton density MR images of all pelves were obtained by use of a 1.5-tesla superconducting magnet (Signa; General Electric Medical Systems, Milwaukee, Wis) with version 5.4 software. The slice thickness was 4 mm
Results
The demographic information for the nulliparous women is shown in Table I.Characteristic Nulliparous (n = 50) Age (y, mean ± SD) 29.340 ± 5.236 Body mass index (kg/m2, mean ± SD) 25.097 ± 5.868 Race White 35 (70%) Black 12 (24%) Hispanic 1 (2%) Asian 1 (2%) Other 1 (2%)
Comment
This study establishes a method to systematically evaluate MR images of pelvic support structures. In fact, this approach may be used to organize and collect observations for any multilevel radiologic imaging study. The advantage of MR imaging is its ability to vividly reveal soft tissue structures without the use of contrast dyes or invasive probes. We found that proton density MR images provided the best resolution of pelvic support structures. We were able to achieve sufficient structural
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Supported by grant RO1 DK51405-01A1 from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases.
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Reprint requests: Queena Chou, MD, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, St Joseph’s Health Care London, 268 Grosvenor St, Room E361, London, Ontario, Canada N6A 4L6.