Serial diffusion-weighted imaging in a patient with MELAS and presumed cytotoxic oedema.
A patient with mitochondrial myopathy, encephalopathy, lactic acidosis and stroke-like episodes (MELAS) was studied with serial diffusion-weighted MRI (DWI) after stroke-like episodes and the apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) was measured in an infarct-like lesion. In the acute and subacute stages, the affected area gave high signal on DWI and its ADC was much lower than that in a normal control region. In the chronic stage, the ADC became higher than that in normal brain. We therefore suggest that the stroke-like episodes did not cause vasogenic oedema but were related to energy failure and cytotoxic oedema.
Wang
X Y
XY
Department of Radiology, Peking University First Hospital, 1000034 Peking, China.
Noguchi
K
K
Takashima
S
S
Hayashi
N
N
Ogawa
S
S
Seto
H
H
D001929:Brain Edema / Q000209:etiology* / Q000473:pathology*; D002648:Child; D002908:Chronic Disease; D038524:Diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D006801:Humans; D017241:MELAS Syndrome / Q000150:complications* / Q000473:pathology*; D008297:Male; D020521:Stroke / Q000150:complications / Q000209:etiology