A MRI may show signs of spinal or paraspinal meningitis in patients who received contaminated steroid injections, according to researchers.
The screening showed abnormalities in 36 of 172 patients screened, according to Anurag Malani, MD, of St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor, Mich., and colleagues.
According to reports, MRIs were performed between 2012 and 2013, allowing for early medical and surgical treatment.
The contaminated steroid lots are linked to 58 deaths and others became sick from the injections, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The patients were accidentally treated with a tainted batch of steroids, but did not receive medical care related to the injection, the research team reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
The CDC said it had "received reports of 20 infections in three states linked to injectable steroids distributed by a Tennessee compounding pharmacy, although none involved fungal meningitis."
"At the time of surgery, 17 of 24 patients (71 percent), including five patients who denied having symptoms, had laboratory evidence of fungal infection," the researchers wrote in their published study. "A proactive outreach to patients receiving injections from a highly contaminated lot ... is needed. Magnetic resonance imaging may detect infection earlier in some patients, leading to more efficacious medical and surgical treatment and improved outcomes."
George Thompson III, MD, of the University of California-Davis, and colleagues, wrote an editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Thompson warned against widespread use of MRI screenings.
"For patients who received spinal injections with steroids from an unknown lot number, MRI-based screening may be appropriate," Thompson's and his colleagues wrote. "Whether patients with normal initial MRI findings receive re-imaging at a later date remains a difficult question in this evolving outbreak."
According to Med Page Today, "wide-scale prophylaxis therapy" would expose patients to potential drug-related toxic effects.
