Effect of hyoscine butylbromide on prostate multiparametric MRI anatomical and functional image quality

To evaluate the effect of the spasmolytic agent hyoscine butylbromide (HBB) on the quality of anatomical and functional imaging of the prostate.

One hundred and seventy-three patients were included in this retrospective study. Eighty-seven patients received intravenous HBB prior to scanning (HBB group) and 86 patients did not (non-HBB group). Multiparametric (mp) 3 T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was performed using a 32-channel body coil. Two radiologists independently evaluated the image quality of T2-weighted imaging (WI), diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) maps, using a five-point Likert scale. DWI was further assessed for distortion and artefact (four-point Likert scale), and T2WI for the presence of motion artefact or blurring. Dynamic contrast-enhanced (DCE) image quality was assessed by recording the number of corrupt contrast curve data points.

T2W image quality in the HBB group was significantly higher than in the non-HBB group (3.63±1.11 versus 2.84±0.899); p<0.001. The HBB group also showed significantly less T2W motion and T2W blur than the non-HBB group (23% and 51.7% versus 53.5% and 83.7%, respectively; p<0.001); however, there was no significant improvement in DWI or ADC image quality, or DWI degree of distortion or artefact. There was a trend towards a lower number of corrupted data points from the contrast curve (2.47±2.44 versus 3.68±2.64), but this did not reach significance (p=0.052).

Administration of HBB significantly improves the image quality of T2WI images. These results provide evidence for the use of HBB in routine patient preparation prior to prostate mpMRI.