Rising utilization of preoperative CT and advances in technology coincided with a decrease in the negative appendectomy rate for women 45 years and younger but not in men of any age or women older than 45 years.

Chronic patellar tendinitis can be a frustrating diagnostic and therapeutic problem. This report evaluates seven tendons in five patients with chronic patellar tendinitis. The etiologies included "jumper's knee" and Osgood-Schlatter disease. In all cases magnetic resonance images (MRI) showed thickening of the tendon. Some of the tendons had focal areas of thickening which helped establish the etiology. All cases had intratendinous areas of increased signal which, in four cases, proved to be chronic tendon tears. MRI is useful in evaluating chronic patellar tendinitis because it establishes the diagnosis, detects associated chronic tears, and may help determine appropriate rehabilitation.

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Thirty magnetic resonance (MR) examinations of the Achilles tendon were performed: 20 from patients without suspected tendon abnormalities; ten from patients with suspected tendon abnormalities. The appearance of the normal Achilles tendon is hypointense and flattened. Partial tears appeared as high-signal intratendinous collections, complete acute ruptures appeared as tendinous discontinuity, and uncomplicated surgical repairs appeared as areas of tendinous continuity with inhomogeneous signal in the operative site. Chronic tendinitis appeared as a diffuse thickening of the tendon. MR imaging of the Achilles tendon at 1.5 T enabled the determination of the degree of tendinous continuity, which may help with diagnosis, treatment, and the pacing of rehabilitation.