Acute anterior spinal artery occlusion: Temporal evolution of diffusion MRI lesion characteristics

Diffusion weighted imaging (DWI) is useful in the diagnosis of anterior spinal artery occlusion, also called as acute spinal stroke. Because of higher density of axonal structures in spinal cord, DWI and ADC (apparent diffusion coefficient) imaging characteristics of ischemic lesions show important differences from strokes occurring in other territories. Furthermore, DWI signal changes over time has not been studied sufficiently in spinal strokes. We herein present a case vignette with acute spinal stroke to remind imaging features and to describe imaging follow-up enabling us to discuss on the pathophysiology of this entity