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Endometriosis on MRI Case 4

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On to the next case.

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So this is a 49-year-old woman who presented with infertility.

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Again, I start with my sagittal T2 non fat saturated images.

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Anterior compartments looking okay.

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In my middle compartment, my uterus is anteverted but retroflexed.

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So my brain is already telling me that there's something going on.

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There's this big mass back here that is involving both the middle compartment

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and tethering back to the posterior compartment back here.

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So we're going to need to dive into that.

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If I look at my axials here,

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so we have one ovary back here on the left.

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We have our right ovary back here.

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They're kind of displaced.

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They're very posterior in location and they're kind of medialized.

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So that's going to be something important for us to discuss as well.

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Then I switch and pull up my T1 fat saturated images

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next to the T2s, so that I can get a sense of both

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the T1 and the T2 character of things at the same time.

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So these

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T2 hyperintense lesions that I'm seeing in both ovaries are more

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T1 hyperintense than they are T2 hyperintense.

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So these are some bilateral endometriomas.

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This area of abnormality along the posterior uterine serosa

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is predominantly T2 and T1 hypointense.

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Although, I'm also seeing areas of T1 hyperintensity

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within it and little cystic areas of T2 hyperintensity within it.

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That's going to tell us what type

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of morphology of deep infiltrating endometriosis we're dealing with.

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I apologize if this is getting a little grainy as I scroll through too quickly.

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And then we're also seeing this kind

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of very T2 dark stellate scarring sort of appearance.

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Okay, so let's put this all together.

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And we'll do so with the sagittal images.

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So here along the posterior uterine serosa,

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at the location of what's called the torus uterinus, which is the junction

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of the uterine body and this uterine cervix along the posterior serosa.

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So right here. It's called the torus uterinus.

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There is a big endometriotic implant,

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and it is both active glandular and chronic stromal fibrotic in morphology.

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So the active glandular part are these

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T1 hyperintense glands that are hemorrhagic and the cystic spaces.

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And the chronic stromal fibrotic component is the T2 dark stellate

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component that is tethering the rectum to the uterus,

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obliterating the rectouterine space here,

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and then extending along both uterosacral ligaments.

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So the uterosacral ligaments extend

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from the torus uterinus on both sides, posteriorly and laterally

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and insert along the sacrum

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on both sides, and help to suspend the uterus and the pelvis.

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If we look at the axial T2s, we can appreciate the morphology

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of that chronic stromal fibrotic component much better.

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And we can see from the torus uterinus, which is right here,

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there's extension of T2 hypointensity, posterolaterally on both sides.

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That's involvement of the very proximal uterosacral ligament.

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Right.

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So I think that was everything that I wanted to point out on this case.

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So we can go to the next question, please.

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So which of the features of this case

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that we've talked about has the biggest impact on surgical planning?

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Is it the presence of both active glandular and chronic stromal fibrotic morphologies?

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The Rectouterine space obliteration?

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Retroflexion of the uterus or the bilateral endometriomas?

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Perfect. Everybody got it right.

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It is rectouterine space obliteration.

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And again, that's really important

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to the surgeons because they do these surgeries laparoscopically and if

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the space is scarred down, they literally cannot get their scope beyond it.

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The active glandular and chronic stromal fibrotic morphologies,

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the presence of endometriomas,

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the retroflexion of the uterus,

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all of those are just findings of that endometriosis,

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but they don't have specific implications for the surgery itself.

Report

Faculty

Kristine S Burk, MD

Instructor in Radiology, Harvard Medical School

Brigham and Women's Hospital

Tags

Uterus

MRI

Gynecologic (Gyn)

Gynecologic (GYN)

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