Quantification of the synovial perfusion in rheumatoid arthritis using Doppler ultrasonography.

In the past decade, Power Doppler ultrasound (PDUS) has been established as a new imaging modality for the evaluation of synovial perfusion in the inflamed joints of patients with rheumatic diseases. Various studies have been dealing with the problem of a reproducible quantification method in PDUS as this still appears to be one of the main disadvantages in comparison with magnetic resonance imaging and also with contrast-enhanced ultrasound technique. The main studies addressing this problem are presented and compared to the recently described three-dimensional power Doppler ultrasound by outlining the advantages and the remaining difficulties in quantifying synovial vascularity with PDUS.