[On the inferior quality of renal sonograms in patients with lumbar meningomyelocele].
OBJECTIVE
Many examiners complain about the inferior quality of renal sonograms in patients with lumbar, meningomyelocele (MMC), especially about the insufficient contrast. The study was carried out in order to scrutinize these reports and to test the hypothesis that this effect might be caused by the increased echogenicity of the abnormally innervated musculature in these patients.


METHODS
In 17 "matched pairs" of patients with lumbar MMC and healthy controls the echogenicity and the contrast of the sonograms of the kidneys, the biceps muscle and the rectus femoris muscle were measured and compared.


RESULTS
Echogenicity and contrast of the renal sonograms were significantly lower in patients with MMC (p = 0.004). Sonography of the musculature of the upper extremities revealed no differences, the echogenicity of the rectus femoris muscle, however, was significantly higher (p = 0.001) in patients with MMC.


CONCLUSIONS
The results presented support the hypothesis that the elevated echogenicity of the abdominal wall and trunk musculature in patients with MMC reduce the effective ultrasound signal.
Eggert
P
P
Klinik für Allgemeine Pädiatrie am Klinikum der Christian Albrechts Universität Kiel. p.eggert@pediatrics.uni-kiel-de
Oppel
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L
D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007668:Kidney / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D008159:Lumbar Vertebrae / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D008297:Male; D008591:Meningomyelocele / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D011786:Quality Control; D012016:Reference Values; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D014463:Ultrasonography / Q000592:standards*