does anyone know what type of injuries x-rays and bone scans dont show?

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clairefeekerry1

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as title really- i know sometimes old or very new injuries dont show on bone scans but anything else? my vet said the bone scan should show soft tissue injury/bone injury, ligament issues but nothing showed on my horses, and on further x rays so is there some types of injuries that dont show??
 
Any soft tissue injury, unless it is catastrophic tendon or ligament injury will rarely show, and neither will muscular. Ultra sound is good for soft tissue.
 
lillith said:
Any soft tissue injury, unless it is catastrophic tendon or ligament injury will rarely show, and neither will muscular. Ultra sound is good for soft tissue.
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my vet said soft tissue and ligament injuries should show as the bone activity increases around it to compensate??? so maybe less serious soft tissue injuries wont show?
 
Well I can only speak from our experience but many x-rays and a bone scan failed to show collateral ligament damage on both forelimbs, could only be diagnosed by an MRI, according to my vet its the best tool for the job!!
 
As a rule of thumb x-rays show boney changes.

If there are boney changes associated with a soft tissue injury then you may get a clue - e.g. sometimes clue given in the wings of the pedal bone on an upright pedal bone view with collateral lig desmitis of the coffin joint. Also occasionally, SL desmitis may have boney changes associated with it.

Do remember that cartilage does NOT show up on a xray - so the trouble is sometimes the arthritic or OCD cases will have only cartilage damage while the bone is still ok...may look fine on the xray, but block to the joint. Scintigraphy, mri or even ct may be better at seeing these changes but often they are seen on diagnostic arthroscopy at surgery.

To answer the original OP - a lot of injuries/disease may not show up on xrays alone.


It's still a very useful tool though!!!

Regards,
Imogen
 
also can depend on the quality of the x ray machine - so one of the vets at our yard has a portable x ray which is very helpful BUT he will refer us onto to another if he isn't sure as he is very upfront that the images are not top notch.
 
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