Role of Various DW MRI and DCE MRI Parameters as Predictors of Malignancy in Solid Pulmonary Lesions

We aimed to evaluate various diffusion and dynamic contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE MRI) parameters in differentiating malignant from benign pulmonary lesions.

We enrolled 31 (22 males) patients who had solid pulmonary lesion(s) >2 cm in our cross sectional study. Of these, 23 (74.2%) were found to be malignant on histopathology. Dynamic contrast-enhanced MRI was performed using 36 dynamic measurements (volumetric interpolated breath-hold examination). Diffusion-weighted MRI (DW MRI) performed at b value of 800 s/mm². We measured different diffusion and perfusion parameters, for example, diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) SI, mean apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC), minimum ADC, lesion-to-spinal cord ratio, DWI score, T2 score, K, K, and V. We stratified values of each parameter as high if it was >median of values observed in our data set and low if it was ≤median. Normally distributed data were compared by unpaired t test, whereas non-normal continuous data were compared by Kruskal Wallis-H test. We applied Wilson score method to calculate sensitivity, specificity, and predictive values of parameters that were statistically significant by type of lesion with reference to histopathological examination as gold standard.

Diffusion-weighted imaging SI, mean ADC, minimum ADC, DWI score and K values were found to be significantly different (P value < .05) by type of lesion. K was found to have the highest diagnostic accuracy (74.2%) among these parameters.

K and mean ADC had similar sensitivity of 65.2%. However, K had highest diagnostic accuracy among various DWI and DCE MRI parameters in predicting malignancy in solid pulmonary lesions. In our study, we found a cutoff value 0.251 min^-1 for K as 100% specific.