Diagnosis of lumbar radiculopathy using simultaneous MR neurography and apparent T2 mapping

•We evaluated an injured nerve root quantitatively using the SHINKEI-Quant technique in patients with lumbar radiculopathy.•Lumbar neurography revealed swelling of the involved nerves, and a prolonged T2 relaxation times compared with that of the contralateral nerves.•T2 ratio correlated with leg pain.•When the T2 relaxation time and T2 ratio thresholds were established as 127ms and 1.07, respectively, the accuracy was high for the diagnosis of lumbar radiculopathy.•SHINKEI-Quant is potential tool for the quantitative evaluation of lumbar radiculopathy. We sought to assess the utility of simultaneous apparent T2 mapping and neurography with the nerve-sheath signal increased by inked rest-tissue rapid acquisition of relaxation-enhancement imaging (SHINKEI-Quant) for the quantitative evaluation of compressed nerves in patients with lumbar radiculopathy. Thirty-two patients with lumbar radiculopathy and 5 healthy subjects underwent simultaneous apparent T2 mapping and neurography with SHINKEI-Quant. Regions of interest (ROIs) were placed in the lumbar dorsal root ganglia (DRG) and the spinal nerves distal to the lumbar nerves bilaterally at L4-S1. The T2 relaxation times were measured on the affected and unaffected sides. The T2 ratio was calculated as the affected side/unaffected side. Pearson correlation coefficients were calculated to determine the correlation between the T2 relaxation times or T2 ratio and clinical symptoms. An ROC curve was used to examine the diagnostic accuracy and threshold of the T2 relaxation times and T2 ratio. We observed no significant differences in the T2 relaxation times between the nerve roots on the left and right at each spinal level in healthy subjects. In patients, lumbar neurography revealed swelling of the involved nerve, and prolonged T2 relaxation times compared with that of the contralateral nerve. The T2 ratio correlated with leg pain. The ROC analysis revealed that the T2 relaxation time threshold was 127 ms and the T2 ratio threshold was 1.07. To our knowledge, this is the first study to show the utility of SHINKEI-Quant for the quantitative evaluation of lumbar radiculopathy.