¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT Parameters Enhance MRI Radiomics for Predicting Human Papilloma Virus Status in Oropharyngeal Squamous...

Predicting human papillomavirus (HPV) status is critical in oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC) radiomics. In this study, we developed a model for HPV status prediction using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) radiomics and ¹⁸F-fluorodeoxyglucose (¹⁸F-FDG) positron emission tomography (PET)/computed tomography (CT) parameters in patients with OPSCC.

Patients with OPSCC who underwent ¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT and contrast-enhanced MRI before treatment between January 2012 and February 2020 were enrolled. Training and test sets (3:2) were randomly selected. ¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT parameters and MRI radiomics feature were extracted. We developed three light-gradient boosting machine prediction models using the training set: Model 1, MRI radiomics features; Model 2, ¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT parameters; and Model 3, combination of MRI radiomics features and ¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT parameters. Area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) values were used to analyze the performance of the models in predicting HPV status in the test set.

A total of 126 patients (118 male and 8 female; mean age: 60 years) were included. Of these, 103 patients (81.7%) were HPV-positive, and 23 patients (18.3%) were HPV-negative. AUROC values in the test set were 0.762 [95% confidence interval (CI), 0.564-0.959], 0.638 (95% CI, 0.404-0.871), and 0.823 (95% CI, 0.668-0.978) for Models 1, 2, and 3, respectively. The net reclassification improvement of Model 3, compared with that of Model 1, in the test set was 0.119.

When combined with an MRI radiomics model, ¹⁸F-FDG PET/CT exhibits incremental value in predicting HPV status in patients with OPSCC.