The utility of magnetic resonance imaging for bone involvement in Gaucher disease. Assessing more than bone crises.

ABSTRACT

Bone effects are the most frequent cause of disability in Gaucher disease (GD). Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has improved the study of bone involvement making it possible to measure the extent of infiltration and to identify localized complications and other lesions. Here we describe the results of our analysis of all bone lesions registered in MRI studies performed in our GD Clinic. A retrospective study was undertaken for all patients with types 1 and 3 GD who underwent MRI evaluation and correlated with clinical, molecular, and other follow-up information obtained from the Spanish GD Registry. 350 MRI studies of 131 GD patients were reviewed (males 53.4%). Mean age 37.5years (range 13-74yr), 94.6% (124) were GD1 patients. 113/131 (86.3%) of patients presented with at least one bone effect (bone infiltration, bone crisis, avascular necrosis) were 79.4%, while 28.8% showed another bone lesion such as neuronopathic-like arthropathy, hemangioma, other ischemic phenomena, infection-related lesions, secondary neoplasia and tissue infiltration. MRI is a routinely-used tool for the evaluation of GD lesions which improves the assessment of patients before and during therapy, identifies GD complications and finds other concomitant lesions. This work provides a new evaluation of MRI assessment in this complex rare disease.