Ultrasonographic characteristics of the median nerve in patients withcarpal tunnel syndrome

Abstract

Introduction: carpal tunnel syndrome is the most common and disabling pathology of the upper limbs.
Objective: to determine the ultrasonographic characteristics of the median nerve in the carpal tunnel in patients with carpal tunnel syndrome. Materials and methods: a systematic search was carried out for
research published between 2014 and 2019, in the open access databases specialized in health sciences:
Google Academic, Ebsco, PubMed, Redalyc, Scielo and Lilacs. Results: through the search for scientific
articles, four articles were collected: three international and one national. No local studies were found.
Conclusions: patients with carpal tunnel syndrome –on ultrasound examination- had bigger measurements
of the cross-sectional area of the median nerve, the most common findings were: 16 mm2 for sectional area
of the median nerve (mean of median nerve sectional area: 18.75 mm2 at the entrance to the carpal tunnel
and 19.28 mm2 at the exit), females had a bigger sectional area of the median nerve at the entrance of
foramen (19.77 mm2) when compared with males (16.72mm2); likewise, it was observed that a bigger
thickness of the flexor retinaculum up to 1.82 mm and a carpal tunnel height of 10.1 mm was present in all
cases.