MRI classification and discrimination of spinal schwannoma and meningioma based on deep learning

Schwannoma (SCH) and meningiomas (MEN) are the two most common primary spinal cord tumors. Differentiating between them preoperatively remains a clinical challenge due to the substantial overlap in their clinical presentation and imaging characteristics.

The objective of this study is to facilitate early diagnosis of patients and reduce clinician stress by constructing a deep learning-based classification model for automatic diagnosis of schwannoma and meningiomas using magnetic resonance images (MRI).

We retrospectively collected MRI images of 74 patients with pathologically confirmed schwannoma and meningiomas from 2015 to 2020 at a local hosipital, and constructed a CNN model based on the PyTorch's deep learning framework for the discrimination between the two. First, a modified feature fusion CNN model (ResNet34-SKConv) was trained by introducing a selective convolutional kernel module into the original CNN model. The introduction of the selective convolutional kernel module enhances the network's focus on tumor features and effectively improves the network's performance. Finally, the trained model was used to process all the MRI image slices to achieve the classification of SCH and MEN patients by the voting prediction method.

Using the 5-fold cross-validation method, this new ResNet34-SKConv model achieves a classification accuracy of 92.32%, a specificity of 95.87%, and a F1-score of 93.54, respectively.

This study demonstrated that a classification model using a deep learning network can be effective in achieving differential diagnosis of SCH and MEN. Thus, the new method has great potential for developing new computer-aided diagnosis and applications with future clinical practice.