OBJECTIVE: To investigate the association between pain and perfusion in bone marrow lesions with and without cysts assessed dynamic contrast-enhanced (DCE)-MRI in patients with knee osteoarthritis.

SUBJECTS AND METHODS: In a cross-sectional setting, perfusion in bone marrow lesions was assessed using 3 Tesla MRI and correlated (Spearman's rank correlation) to pain using the knee injury and osteoarthritis outcome score (KOOS). Bone marrow lesions were assessed across the whole knee with DCE-MRI using heuristic variable and non-contrast-enhanced-MRI using MRI osteoarthritis knee score.

RESULTS: Data were available from 107 participants. The participants had a mean age of 60.8 years, mean BMI of 34.5 kg/m2, mean KOOS-pain of 63.7 (0-100 scale), and mean bone marrow lesion sum score of 6.5 (0-45 scale). The bivariate association between KOOS-pain and the heuristic perfusion variable time to peak in bone marrow lesions containing subchondral cysts showed a statistically significant correlation (r = 0.40; p = 0.002). The perfusion variables were not correlated with KOOS-pain in bone marrow lesions without cysts.

CONCLUSION: In this cross-sectional study, the rate of perfusion (TTP) in bone marrow lesions containing subchondral cysts was associated with pain in patients with knee OA. DCE-MRI has a potential to be used for separating subtypes of OA.