Cancer Imaging (Jun 2021)

Can preoperative liver MRI with gadoxetic acid help reduce open-close laparotomies for curative intent pancreatic cancer surgery?

  • Kartik S. Jhaveri,
  • Ali Babaei Jandaghi,
  • Seng Thipphavong,
  • Osvaldo Espin-Garcia,
  • Anna Dodd,
  • Shawn Hutchinson,
  • Trevor W. Reichman,
  • Carol-Anne Moulton,
  • Ian D. McGilvary,
  • Steven Gallinger

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1186/s40644-021-00416-4
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 21, no. 1
pp. 1 – 12

Abstract

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Abstract Objectives To evaluate gadoxetic acid-enhanced liver MRI (EOB-MRI) versus contrast-enhanced computed tomography (CECT) for preoperative detection of liver metastasis (LM) and reduction of open-close laparotomies for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC). Methods Sixty-six patients with PDAC had undergone preoperative EOB-MRI and CECT. LM detection by EOB-MRI and CECT and their impact on surgical planning, open-close laparotomies were compared by clinical and radiology reports and retrospective analysis of imaging by two blinded independent readers. Histopathology or imaging follow-up was the reference standard. Statistical analysis was performed at patient and lesion levels with two-sided McNemar tests. Results EOB-MRI showed higher sensitivity versus CECT (71.7% [62.1-80.0] vs. 34% [25.0-43.8]; p = 0.009), comparable specificity (98.6%, [96.9-99.5] vs. 100%, [99.1-100], and higher AUROC (85.1%, [80.4-89.9] vs. 66.9%, [60.9-73.1]) for LM detection. An incremental 7.6% of patients were excluded from surgery with a potential reduction of up to 13.6% in futile open-close laparotomies due to LM detected on EOB-MRI only. Conclusions Preoperative EOB-MRI has superior diagnostic performance in detecting LM from PDAC. This better informs surgical eligibility with potential reduction of futile open-close laparotomies from attempted curative intent pancreatic cancer surgery.

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