Spinal Infections

Spinal cord infections can present with a wide variety of imaging findings, depending on the pathogen and the host's immune status. Infectious myelitis can have a characteristic distribution of lesions within the spinal cord, which refine the differential disease. Some spinal infections do not show typical imaging features, and many noninfectious may mimic spinal infections with similar MR imaging findings. Infectious arachnoiditis and meningitis must be differentiated from neoplasms. Spondylitis has many mimickers and requires careful interpretations of images, clinical findings, and follow-up information.