Stress Fracture Spectrum, Pathophysiology, and Emerging Bone Imaging Techniques

Review of stress fractures: from fatigue and insufficiency injuries to spondylolysis and atypical femur fractures. Future directions include zero echo time MRI and deep learning-based CT for early osteoporosis detection.

• Stress fractures encompass fatigue fractures (abnormal stress on healthy bone) and insufficiency fractures (normal stress on weakened bone).
• Specific manifestations include spondylolysis, distal clavicular osteolysis, atypical femur fractures, and pregnancy-associated vertebral compression fractures.
• Emerging tools: zero echo time MRI generates CT-like images; deep learning synthetic CT and opportunistic CT screening enable early osteoporosis detection through automated trabecular attenuation analysis.

Automated summary

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