Characterization of time-enhancement curves of benign and malignant prostate tissue at dynamic MR imaging

Our objectives were to determine time-enhancement curves of prostate cancer, peripheral zone, and adenoma at gadolinium-enhanced MR imaging, and to determine if a high-spatial/low-temporal dynamic imaging could be accurate in depicting prostate cancer, or if a higher temporal resolution (and a lower spatial resolution) should be favored. Thirty-nine patients with prostate cancer underwent MR imaging before radical prostatectomy by using T1- and T2-weighted axial images and a single-slice dynamic gadolinium-enhanced sequence (40 images; one image per 6 s; injection of 20 ml at 2 ml/s). After analysis of the pathologic specimens, four region-of-interest (ROI) cursors (cancer, peripheral zone, adenoma, and muscle) were retrospectively placed on dynamic images. Time-enhancement curves of the ROIs were obtained. The theoretical accuracy of a 30-s dynamic multislice MR sequence in depicting cancer within peripheral zone and adenoma (ROC curves) was calculated from these curves. On average, prostate cancer enhanced more and earlier than peripheral zone and adenoma, but there were great interindividual variations. For start delays ranging from 12 to 84 s, the areas under the ROC curves ranged from 0.602 to 0.698 for the depiction of cancer within adenoma and from 0.614 to 0.827 for the depiction of cancer within peripheral zone. The best results were obtained with a 36-s start delay. In conclusion, we found a 30-s scanning window which seems to allow a good depiction of cancer within peripheral zone. Because of largely overlapping enhancement patterns, cancer will probably not be depicted within adenoma by dynamic imaging, at least by using low temporal resolution.