Scoring hip osteoarthritis with MRI (SHOMRI): A whole joint osteoarthritis evaluation system

Background: To develop a semi-quantitative MR-based hip osteoarthritis (OA) evaluation system (Scoring hip osteoarthritis with MRI, SHOMRI), and to test its reproducibility and face validity.

Methods: The study involved 98 subjects with informed consent. Three-Tesla MR imaging of hip was performed in three planes with intermediate-weighted fat saturated FSE sequences. Two radiologists assessed cartilage loss, bone marrow edema pattern, subchondral cyst in 10 subregions, and assessed labrum in 4 subregions. In addition, presence or absence of ligamentum teres integrity, paralabral cysts, intra-articular body, and effusion in the hip joint were analyzed using the SHOMRI system. The reproducibility was assessed with intra-class correlation coefficient (ICC), Cohen's Kappa values and percent agreement. SHOMRI scores were correlated with radiographic Kellgren-Lawrence (KL) and OARSI atlas gradings, and clinical parameters, the hip osteoarthritis outcome score (HOOS) and hip range of motion (ROM), using Spearman's rank correlation and ordinal logistic regression.

Results: ICC values were in the excellent range, 0.91 to 0.97. Cohen's Kappa values and percent agreement ranged from 0.55 to 0.79 and 66 to 99%, respectively. SHOMRI demonstrated significant correlations with KL and OARSI gradings as well as with clinical parameters, HOOS and ROM (P < 0.05). Among the SHOMRI features, subchondral cyst and bone marrow edema pattern showed the highest correlation with HOOS and ROM.

Conclusion: SHOMRI demonstrated moderate to excellent reproducibility and significant correlation with radiographic gradings and clinical parameters.