Sectional Anatomy of the Adrenal Gland in the Coronal Plane
Purpose: To provide practical anatomic data for the imaging diagnosis and surgical treatment of adrenal disease. Materials and Methods: we investigated the anatomy of the adrenal gland and its relationships to regional structures using 31 sets of serial coronal sections of upper abdomen of Chinese adult cadavers and correlated coronal MR images of 10 upper abdomens of Chinese adult healthy volunteers and coronal reconstructed MSCT images of 5 patients. Results: The adrenal glands were visualized mainly on the successive coronal sections between 18mm anterior to the posterior margin of inferior vena cava and 24mm posterior to the posterior margin of inferior vena cava. The left adrenal gland was visualized 2 sections earlier than the right adrenal gland in general. On the plane through the anterior parts of bilateral renal hili (A18), the appearance rate of bilateral adrenal glands was 100％, and the maximal measurements of bilateral adrenal glands were visualized. The length, width, thickness of right adrenal body, thickness of medial limb and lateral limb were respectively 34.02±2.12mm, 10.91±0.89mm, 5.82± 0.26mm, 2.78±0.08mm, 2.62±0.06mm, whereas the measurements of left adrenal gland were 28.31±2.46mm, 18.40±1.06mm, 6.84± 0.24mm, 3.02±0.08mm, 2.86±0.07mm respectively. Conclusion: The coronal plane has superior advantage in showing the bilateral adrenal glands. The shapes of adrenal glands are various, whereas the range of adrenal thickness is quite narrow. The thickness of adrenal medial and lateral limbs, especially the thickness of lateral limb are useful for the diagnosis of the bilateral adrenocortical disease. Adrenal glands are situated in the extraperitoneal perirenal space. There are great varieties of the adrenal diseases and their clinical manifestations are complicated (1-3). Therefore, adrenal glands are one of the interesting investigative subjects of the clinic, especially in the medical imaging and surgery. Recently, the development of multislice spiral CT (MSCT) and its image postprocessing ability as well as modem high-speed scanning sequence of MRI, imaging technologies provide useful images that more clearly demonstrate the complicated anatomical relationships of the adrenal glands and their diseases on the transverse, sagittal, coronal, and oblique planes (4-8). Furthermore, coronal imaging techniques are more and more available. The sectional anatomies of the adrenal glands on the transverse (9-14) and sagittal (15) planes have been reported. In addition, adrenal vasculature and its embryologic development have been reported (16, 17). The adrenal volume determination using CT and MRI (11, 18, 19) has also been reported. Furthermore, the deep position of the adrenal glands and their complex relationships with their nearby structures and viscera complicate the clinical analysis of the many diseases affecting the adrenal glands. Better anatomical information is needed to facilitate the diagnosis and surgical treatment of adrenal disease. However, as yet, the detailed systemic sectional anatomy and normal imaging of the adrenal glands in the coronal plane has not been reported. Therefore, this paper provided new anatomical details regarding the sectional anatomy of the adrenal glands and related structures and viscera in the coronal plane. Data were obtained using serial coronal cadaver sections, coronal MR images of healthy volunteers, and coronal reconstructed MSCT images of patients.
Gang Ma Shuwei Liu Zhenmei Zhao Xiangtao Lin Li Lou Zhenping Li Yuchun Tang Shizhen Zhong
Research Center for Sectional and Imaging Anatomy, Shandong University School of Medicine, Jinan 250 Research Center for Sectional and Imaging Anatomy, Shandong University School of Medicine, Jinan 250 Research Center for Sectional and Imaging Anatomy, Shandong University School of Medicine, Jinan 250 Shandong Medical Imaging Institute, Jinan Department of Anatomy, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, China
国际会议
首届国际断层影像解剖学研讨会(The 1st International Symposium on Sectional and Inaging Anatomy)
青岛
英文
151-159
2007-12-15（万方平台首次上网日期，不代表论文的发表时间）