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MRI in healthy volunteers — important to do, and do correctly

Nature Reviews Rheumatology volume 12, pages 563–564 (2016)Cite this article

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A new study of 'symptom-free' volunteers reports a surprisingly high prevalence of MRI features usually associated with rheumatoid arthritis (particularly bone marrow oedema), but the interpretation of these findings highlights several methodological issues. MRI assessment of healthy joints is clearly essential but should be carried out in a stringent fashion.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Copenhagen Center for Arthritis Research, Center for Rheumatology and Spine Diseases, Rigshospitalet, Nordre Ringvej 57, 2600 Glostrup, Denmark, and at the Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Blegdamsvej 3B, 2200 Copenhagen, Denmark.,

    Mikkel Østergaard

  2. Department of Rheumatology, Diakonhjemmet Hospital, Diakonveien 12, 0370 Oslo, Norway, and at the Institute of Health and Society, University of Oslo, Forskningsveien 3A, 0373 Oslo, Norway.,

    Espen A. Haavardsholm

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  1. Mikkel Østergaard
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  2. Espen A. Haavardsholm
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Correspondence to Mikkel Østergaard.

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Competing interests

M.Ø. declares that he has received research support and/or consultancy or speaker fees from Abbvie, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Boehringer-Ingelheim, Celgene, Eli Lilly, Centocor, GlaxoSmithKline, Hospira, Janssen, Merck, Mundipharma, Novartis, Novo, Orion, Pfizer, Regeneron, Schering-Plough, Roche, Takeda, UCB and Wyeth. E.H. declares no competing interests.

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Østergaard, M., Haavardsholm, E. MRI in healthy volunteers — important to do, and do correctly. Nat Rev Rheumatol 12, 563–564 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrrheum.2016.142

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