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Osteomyelitis from Ingrown Toenail

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Dr. P here.

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3 00:00:02,100 --> 00:00:05,650 I've got a 53-year-old female with unguis

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incarnatus, also known as onychocryptosis,

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also known by the common name of ingrown toenail.

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She's got pain and swelling of the great toe.

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It's been going on for

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6 months, no prior

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intervention, no prior surgery.

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On the far left, we've got a T1

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spin echo, fat-weighted image.

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In the middle, a T2 fat-suppressed

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image, and on the far right,

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a proton density fat-suppressed image.

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Let's scroll, and the great toe's

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distal aspect has completely erased.

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It's disappeared.

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Now, there's a companion case with

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this, another osteomyelitis,

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a stubbed toe osteomyelitis in a child.

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In which most of the wipeout

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occurred in the medullary space.

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That's uncommon.

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This is the more typical scenario where

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you have trouble even finding any cortex.

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Maybe a little bit back here

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on the T1-weighted image.

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Now the way to approach these osteomyelitis

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cases is you look at the most heavily water-

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weighted sequence, which is right here,

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and then there's another pretty good one right here.

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And if you don't see any edema

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at all, then you can essentially exclude

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the diagnosis of osteomyelitis.

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You're done with osteo.

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However, if you have edema on the water-weighted

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image, that does not mean you have osteomyelitis.

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You've got to go back to the T1-weighted

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image and look for erasure of medullary and

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cortical bone, which we have here in spades.

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It's rather profound, especially on

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this water-weighted sequence, too.

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But the T1-weighted image is the specifier.

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That's the one that puts the

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hammer down on osteomyelitis.

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Let's look at a few other projections.

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Let's take the T1-weighted, T2-weighted,

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and proton density images in the short

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axis view and look at what this osteo is

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doing from the top down on the cortex.

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It's just destroying the cortex.

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That's not cortex; that's reactive change in

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bone that's just being crunched and eaten away.

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The long axis images, I think,

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are similarly revelatory.

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Here is the water-weighted image.

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The entire toe is edematous,

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but look at the T1-weighted image.

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I mean, where is the cortex?

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There's cortex on this side,

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there's a little bit of cortex here.

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Gone, gone, all the way around

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to the top, and gone at the base.

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So what are your other jobs in deciding the

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report appearance, especially the conclusion,

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for the clinician in a case like this?

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You want to say where the osteo is.

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You want to say how far back it goes.

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You want to say whether it crosses the joint.

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This is part of your checklist.

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You want to say whether you see air or gas.

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A plain film can be helpful there.

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Is there a fluid collection to drain and get

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some bugs, like an abscess or a microabscess?

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Is there a sinus tract?

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Is there an abscess inside the bone?

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Does it cross the joint?

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Is there septic arthritis?

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Does it involve the adjacent bone?

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And if it does, how far proximally does it go?

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So you can prepare for an amputation.

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This is aggressive, penetrating,

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infiltrative, osteomyelitis of the great toe.

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Dr. P out.

Report

Faculty

Stephen J Pomeranz, MD

Chief Medical Officer, ProScan Imaging. Founder, MRI Online

ProScan Imaging

Tags

Musculoskeletal (MSK)

MSK

MRI

Infectious

Foot & Ankle

Bone & Soft Tissues

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