Abstract
This study aimed to determine whether ultrasonography (US) can detect increased vascular signal in the synovial tissue before overt synovitis in rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Env-pX rats that spontaneously develop RA-like synovitis were used. Ankle joints of 15 pre-morbid env-pX rats were observed with power Doppler and superb microvascular imaging (SMI) using an ultrahigh-frequency (8–24 MHz) probe. Signal values were counted as the number of pixels. The total number of vessels and vessel area in the synovial tissue were histologically evaluated. Dilated vessels were determined from the mean value of synovial vessels in three wild-type rats. In all env-pX rats, apparent synovial proliferation was not observed. However, vasodilation was evident. Only SMI values were significantly correlated with the number of dilated vessels (r = 0.585, p = 0.022) but not with the total number of vessels. US with SMI using ultrahigh-frequency probe can detect increased vascular signal in the synovial tissue of arthritis-prone rats.
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