Wallenberg's lateral medullary syndrome: diffusion‐weighted imaging findings

Abstract

Purpose: To investigate the efficacy of diffusion‐weighted imaging in patients with Wallenberg's lateral medullary syndrome. Material and Methods: Thirteen patients with Wallenberg's lateral medullary syndrome were examined with conventional and echoplanar diffusion‐weighted magnetic resonance (MR) imaging in a 1.5 T magnetic resonance unit. MR examinations were obtained in the acute or subacute stage of clinical syndrome, and diffusion‐weighted imaging (DWI) was considered to be positive for infarction when an increase in signal was seen on b=1000 s/mm2 images in the posterolateral medullary localization. Results: DWIs were positive in 12 patients in the acute or subacute stages of this clinical syndrome. A false‐negative result was obtained in only one patient examined within the first day, 10 h after onset of the symptoms. In the visual evaluation of the DWI, the contrast between normal and infarcted brainstem area was better in the high b‐value images than in the apparent diffusion coefficient map images. Conclusion: DWI is a valuable technique for examining patients presenting with the signs and symptoms of Wallenberg's syndrome and high b‐value images can provide complementary data to T2‐weighted images. However, because most of our case group were in either the acute or subacute stage, true sensitivity of the method in the hyperacute stage of the syndrome remains unclear.