Evaluating non articular causes of shoulder pain: A prospective study to determine the diagnostic accuracy of Ultrasound in reference to conventional MRI

Abstract

Shoulder pain is one of the commonest musculoskeletal complaints presented to orthopedics and rheumatologists. Shoulder is a joint commonly affected by degenerative changes, overuse and traumatic lesions. Many imaging techniques could be used in assessment of painful shoulder joint, including plain radiographs, computerized tomography, magnetic resonance imaging and high-resolution ultrasonography. High resolution ultrasonography has advantages over other modalities in term of patient comfort, availability, low cost compared to CT and MRI, in addition to its diagnostic potential: its ability to be performed in real time for correlation the exact site of patient complaint, comparison with the other healthy side, dynamic evaluation, its high resolution and power Doppler evaluation of different lesions. Ultrasonography also shows no hazards of radiation exposure compared to CT and plain radiographs, and no contraindications compared to MRI studies as for patients with pace maker. The aim of our study was to evaluate degree of inter-method agreement between high resolution ultrasonography and MRI in assessment of various causes of shoulder pain. This study included 52 patients, ranging in age from 19 to 78-year-old. They were referred to the Radiology Department at Ain Shams University hospitals, during the period from march to august 2017.