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Updated: May 30, 2026

Magnetic Resonance Imaging of Multiple Sclerosis at 7.0 Tesla
Published on: February 19, 2021
Detection of middle ear cholesteatoma by diffusion-weighted MR imaging: multishot echo-planar imaging compared with
K Yamashita1, T Yoshiura, A Hiwatashi
1Department of Clinical Radiology, Graduate School of Medical Sciences, Kyushu University, Fukuoka, Japan.
Background And Purpose:
Previous reports have shown that DWI is useful in detecting cholesteatoma. SS-EPI is the most widely used DWI technique. However, SS-EPI may have susceptibility artifacts due to field inhomogeneity in the imaging of the temporal bone region. Our purpose was to prospectively evaluate the advantage of MS-EPI for the diagnosis of middle ear cholesteatoma by comparing it with SS-EPI.
Materials And Methods:
We studied 29 patients with preoperatively suspected acquired cholesteatoma. Each patient underwent an MR imaging examination including both SS-EPI and MS-EPI by using a 1.5T MR imaging scanner. Images of the 29 patients (58 temporal bones including 30 with and 28 without cholesteatoma) were reviewed by 2 independent neuroradiologists. The confidence level for the presence of cholesteatoma was graded on a scale of 0-2 (0 = none, 1 = equivocal, 2 = definite). Interobserver agreement as well as sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy were assessed for the 2 readers.
Results:
Excellent interobserver agreement was shown for both MS-EPI (κ = 0.856) and SS-EPI (κ = 0.820). MS-EPI was associated with higher sensitivity (76.7%) and accuracy (87.9%) than SS-EPI (sensitivity = 50.0%, accuracy = 74.1%) (P < .05), while both methods showed 100% specificity.
Conclusions:
Compared with SS-EPI, MS-EPI improves the accuracy of the diagnosis of acquired middle ear cholesteatomas.
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