Frontiers in Neurology (Feb 2020)

Recognition of Brain Metastases Using Gadolinium-Enhanced SWI MRI: Proof-of-Concept Study

  • Joel Ceballos-Ceballos,
  • Diego A. Loza-Gallardo,
  • Marco A. Barajas-Romero,
  • Carlos Cantú-Brito,
  • Sergio Iván Valdés-Ferrer,
  • Sergio Iván Valdés-Ferrer,
  • Sergio Iván Valdés-Ferrer

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3389/fneur.2020.00005
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 11

Abstract

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Background and purpose: SWI MRI, a T2*-dominant MRI sequence with T1 shine-through effect, uses intrinsic structural susceptibility to create enhancement among brain structures. We evaluated whether gadolinium-enhanced SWI (SWI-Gd) improves brain metastasis detection in combination with other MRI sequences.Materials and methods: MRI images of 24 patients (46 studies) were prospectively acquired using a 1.5-T scanner. T1-weighted, unenhanced SWI (SWI-U) and SWI-Gd were evaluated blindly to clinical features by two board-certified radiologists.Results: SWI-Gd revealed more significant metastatic lesions than either T1-Gd or SWI-U (p = 0.0004 for either comparator sequence). Moreover, SWI-Gd revealed more lesions only for those patients with ≤5 lesions on T1-Gd (n = 30 studies from 16 patients; p = 0.046). Performing SWI-Gd added <5 min of scanning time with no further additional risk.Conclusions: Our findings suggest that, when added to T1-Gd and other common sequences, SWI-Gd may improve the diagnostic yield of brain metastases with only a few extra minutes of scanning time and no further risk than that of a regular gadolinium-enhanced MRI.

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