We’re messing with my pain med, trying to find a range where the pain is controlled and yet I’m not nauseous nor chasing butterflies (our playful term for that wonderful “wheee!” feeling). This means I am able to focus on things longer which is good. I’ve spent the past two days nodding off, hurling, and saying things like “oh, shiny!”.
I’m taking advantage of this focus by trying to figure out just what the MRI report is saying. I’ve learned more than I ever wanted to know about MRI and big words like chondromalacia.
The thing with this report is that there are two situations it is discussing. One is the actual injury and the other is the stuff that was already wrong with the knee. For example:
A few tiny subchondral cysts are present in the patella laterally……5. Chondromalacia patella
The first are little bubbles or cracks of stuff that forms from osteoarthritis (OA). I’ve got OA in most, if not all, of my larger joints. The other one name for “runner’s knee” and for “Patello-femoral Pain Syndrome” meaning the cartilage under the kneecap (the patella) is irritated, inflamed, or even peeled up. I’ve known about this for years since my kneecaps are off-track (no pun intended) and have been for years. This, too, then is just signs of OA.
Then we get into the highly technical stuff.
“decreased T1 and increased T2 signal intensity” and “dark T1, bright T2 signal intensity”
This one was a little more difficult to figure out. I’ve seen these terms used before on other MRI results of mine before, though. I found some articles that were way over my brain capacity. But after reading several different stuff, I *think* T1 shows material and T2 shows fluid. So a dark T1, bright T2 section would be fluid, such as edema. This is like where an x-ray shows dark areas where there’s no bone and light areas where there is bone. So basically the report says there’s a lot of fluid/edema on the knee. No shit! It looked like a football at that point!
BONES: there is a fracture of the proximal left tibia involving the plateau posteriorly and laterally. The tibial plateau fracture is depressed approximately 3mm……There is also a small fracture of the proximal left fibula with some surrounding edema.
– Proximal means close to the body, or the top end.
– Plateau is the part of the bone where it flattens off at the joint.
– Posteriorly means in the back
– laterally means to the side, in this case, the side opposite the other knee
– Depressed fracture usually means impact depth (ouch!)
So the left tibia (does he mean the left leg or does he mean the left side?) has a crack near the top plateau going from the back and around to the side that is 3mm (0.1181099 inch) deep and the fibula has a small crack near the top, too. This type of break is also known as a “fender” break from when someone is hit by a car. It is possible that I hit that leg on the sidewalk when I landed. I know, though, that I hurt something when I first stumbled but as much as my right knee hurts, it is possible I hurt it, fell, and broke the other.
The right knee hurts almost as much as the left minus the nasty swelling. It is hot to the touch and only today have I been able to prod the kneecap enough to determine its location. Hopefully when I see the orthopedist Tuesday, we can discuss possible damage there, too.
There. A bunch of words for “it cracked”.