Muscle Ultrasound (Tears/Laceration)

Its most frequent indication is for the evaluation of tears, with different manifestations and classifications depending on the mechanism, the degree of injury, the location and the anatomy of the different muscles.

The most frequent are indirect ones due to muscle distension that cross two joints.

Tears can be found from low grade fibrillar, partial fascicular, to complete, with variable presence of hematomas or liquid collections of different sizes. Depending on their location in the muscle, they can be intrasubstance, peripheral myofascial or in the myotendineal junction. In the case of direct trauma, there may be compression rupture against the bone or laceration from a penetrating wound.

It should be mentioned that sometimes small tears may not be evident on ultrasound in the first 24-48 hours, so if the symptoms are consistent and the US is negative, a subsequent ultrasound re-evaluation is suggested.

Depending on the evolution, over time fibrous scars, re-tear areas or muscle hernias due to rupture of the fascia can be found.

Tumors that affect the musculature, which are of varied etiologies, can also be evaluated and characterized.

Another alteration to be found is muscle edema, which is visualized as an increase in echogenicity without alteration of the fibrillar pattern, which is a nonspecific ultrasound sign and must be correlated with the clinical history, for example, in cases of inflammatory or infectious myositis, denervation, concussion trauma, low-grade muscle strain, and DOMS (late-onset muscle pain syndrome) after some repetitive and / or strenuous physical activity.