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Updated: Jun 19, 2026
Tracking the Mammary Architectural Features and Detecting Breast Cancer with Magnetic Resonance Diffusion Tensor Imaging
Published on: December 15, 2014
Non-mass-like enhancement on contrast-enhanced breast MR imaging: lesion characterization using combination of
Hidetake Yabuuchi1, Yoshio Matsuo, Takeshi Kamitani
1Department of Clinical Radiology, Graduate School of Medical Sciences, Kyushu University, 3-1-1 Maidashi, Higashi-ku, Fukuoka 812-8582, Japan. yabuuchi@radiol.med.kyushu-u.ac.jp
Purpose:
To evaluate the diagnostic accuracy of a combination of dynamic contrast-enhanced MR imaging (DCE-MRI) and diffusion-weighted MR imaging (DWI) in characterization of lesions showing non-mass-like enhancement on breast MR imaging and to find the strongest discriminators between carcinoma and benignancy.
Materials And Methods:
We analyzed consecutive MR images in 45 lesions showing non-mass like enhancement in 41 patients. We analyzed lesion size, distribution, internal enhancement, kinetic curve pattern, and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) values. We applied univariate and multivariate analyses to find the strongest indicators for malignancy. In a validation study, 22 non-mass-like enhancement lesions in 21 patients were examined. We calculated diagnostic accuracy when we presume category 4b, 4c, and 5 lesions as malignant or high to moderate suspicion for malignancy, and category 4a and 3 as low suspicion for malignancy or benign.
Results:
Segmental distribution (P=0.018), clumped internal enhancement (P=0.005), and ADC less than 1.3 x 10(-3) mm(2)/s (P=0.047) were the strongest MR indicators of malignancy. In a validation study, sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value and accuracy were 87% (13/15), 86% (6/7), 93% (13/14), 75% (6/8) and 86% (19/22), respectively.
Conclusion:
The combination of DCE-MRI and DWI showed high diagnostic accuracy in characterization of non-mass-like enhancement lesions on breast MR images.
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