Wrist MRI has a reputation for being difficult, and it is mostly a reputation built on anatomy. Know the carpal rows, the ligaments that hold them in alignment and the compartments around them, and the pathology becomes legible.
This is our complete wrist MRI series, free to watch, in seven parts.
1. Carpal bones
The rows, the arcs, and the normal relationships everything else is measured against.
2. TFCC
Triangular fibrocartilage anatomy, tear patterns, and the degenerative change that is normal with age.
3. Carpal instability
Scapholunate and lunotriquetral ligaments, DISI and VISI, and what the plain film was already telling you.
4. Impaction syndromes
Ulnar impaction, ulnar variance, and the marrow change that goes with it.
5. Tendons
The extensor compartments, de Quervain, and tenosynovitis worth mentioning.
6. Guyon canal
The ulnar nerve in its tunnel, and the lesions that compress it.
7. Stener lesion and accessory muscles
The thumb injury that needs surgery, and the normal variants that look like disease.
Where to go next
The rest of our musculoskeletal MRI teaching follows the same format: shoulder, lumbar spine, ankle and wrist. For trauma radiographs rather than MRI, see our red dot and x-ray interpretation page.
For structured case practice with feedback and a CPD certificate, the Boston MSK MRI Review covers the full MSK curriculum.
Radicon Institute of Radiology has taught radiology since 2017, with over ninety filmed tutorials and delegates across the UK, the Gulf and South Asia.
