Journal List > Investig Magn Reson Imaging > v.22(2) > 1098680

Park, Kim, Lee, Kim, Kim, Ahn, Kim, and Lee: Comparison of 3D Volumetric Subtraction Technique and 2D Dynamic Contrast Enhancement Technique in the Evaluation of Contrast Enhancement for Diagnosing Cushing's Disease

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to compare the performance of the T1 3D subtraction technique and the conventional 2D dynamic contrast enhancement (DCE) technique in diagnosing Cushing's disease.

Materials and Methods

Twelve patients with clinically and biochemically proven Cushing's disease were included in the study. In addition, 23 patients with a Rathke's cleft cyst (RCC) diagnosed on an MRI with normal pituitary hormone levels were included as a control, to prevent non-blinded positive results. Postcontrast T1 3D fast spin echo (FSE) images were acquired after DCE images in 3T MRI and image subtraction of pre- and postcontrast T1 3D FSE images were performed. Inter-observer agreement, interpretation time, multiobserver receiver operating characteristic (ROC), and net benefit analyses were performed to compare 2D DCE and T1 3D subtraction techniques.

Results

Inter-observer agreement for a visual scale of contrast enhancement was poor in DCE (κ = 0.57) and good in T1 3D subtraction images (κ = 0.75). The time taken for determining contrast-enhancement in pituitary lesions was significantly shorter in the T1 3D subtraction images compared to the DCE sequence (P < 0.05). ROC values demonstrated increased reader confidence range with T1 3D subtraction images (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.94–1.00) compared with DCE (95% CI: 0.70–0.92) (P < 0.01). The net benefit effect of T1 3D subtraction images over DCE was 0.34 (95% CI: 0.12–0.56). For Cushing's disease, both reviewers misclassified one case as a nonenhancing lesion on the DCE images, while no cases were misclassified on T1 3D subtraction images.

Conclusion

The T1 3D subtraction technique shows superior performance for determining the presence of enhancement on pituitary lesions compared with conventional DCE techniques, which may aid in diagnosing Cushing's disease.

References

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Fig. 1.
Images of a 37-year-old female patient diagnosed with Cushing disease. On conventional dynamic contrast enhanced images (a), both reviewers recorded the visual scale as 1 (suspicious enhancement) (arrows). On subtraction image (b), there is definite contrast enhancement of the lesion, which was defined as having a higher value compared to the subtracted temporal white matter. Both reviewers recorded the visual scale as 2 (definite contrast enhancement) (arrow).
imri-22-102f1.tif
Fig. 2.
Images of a 32-year-old female patient diagnosed with Rathke's cleft cyst. On conventional dynamic images (a), reviewer 1 recorded the visual scale as 1 (suspicious contrast enhancement) and reviewer 2 recorded the visual scale as 2 (definite contrast enhancement) (arrows). On subtraction image (b), there is no contrast enhancement of the lesion and both reviewers recorded the visual scales as 0 (no contrast enhancement) (arrow).
imri-22-102f2.tif
Table 1.
Imaging Parameters for the Conventional Dynamic Enhancement and T1 3D Fast Spin Echo Sequences
Dyenamic contrast enhancement T1 3D fast spin echo
Field of view (mm) 180 180
Matrix size 384 × 256 384 × 256
Slice thickness/spacing (mm) 2/3 1/0.5
TR/TE (ms) 38 0 or 325/9.6 or 10.1 530/16 or 17
Flip angle 111 Variable
Echo train length 3 24
Number of excitations 1 2
Scan time (minutes: seconds) 2:3 36 (31seconds/ phase) 3:16

TE = echo time; TR = repetition time

Table 2.
Interpretati of Contrast Enhance on Time (second) Taken for Deterrmination
  DCE T1 3D subtraction P value
Cushing + RCC (n = 3 35) 17.9 ± 12.0 8.1 ± 5.2 < 0.001
Cushing (n = 12) 23.5 ± 15.2 9.5 ± 6.7 < 0.001
RCC (n = 23) 15.0 ± 8.7 7.4 ± 4.2 < 0.001

DCE = dynamic contrast enhancement; RCC = Ra thke's cleft cyst

Table 3.
Interpretation Results for Diagnosis of Cushing Disease and RCC on DCE and Subtraction Images
    Cushing (n = 12) RCC (n = 23)
CE Suspicious NCE CE Suspicious NCE
Reviewer 1 DCE 9 (75) 2 (16.7) 1 (8.3) 4 (17.4) 8 (34.8) 11 (47.8)
  T1 3D subtracti ion 12 (100) 0 (0) 0 (0) 0 (0) 1 (4.3) 22 (95.7)
Reviewer 2 DCE 8 (66.7) 3 (25.0) 1 (8.3) 5 (21.7) 5 (21.7) 13 (56.6)
  T1 3D subtracti ion 8 (66.7) 4 (33.3) 0 (0) 1 (4.4) 3 (13.0) 19 (82.6)

Data are presented as number of patients (%). CE = contrast enhancement; DCE = dynamic contrast enhancement; NCE = no contrast enhancement; RCC = Rathke's cleft cyst

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