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MR elastography of liver tumours: value of viscoelastic properties for tumour characterisation

  • Hepatobiliary-Pancreas
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Abstract

Objectives

To assess the value of the viscoelastic parameters in the characterisation of liver tumours at MR elastography.

Patients and methods

Ninety-four patients with liver tumours >1 cm prospectively underwent MR elastography using 50-Hz mechanical waves and a full three-directional motion-sensitive sequence. The model-free viscoelastic parameters (the complex shear modulus and its real and imaginary parts, i.e. the storage and loss moduli) were calculated in 72 lesions after exclusion of cystic, treated or histopathologically undetermined tumours.

Results

We observed higher absolute shear modulus and loss modulus in malignant versus benign tumours (3.38 ± 0.26 versus 2.41 ± 0.15 kPa, P < 0.01 and 2.25 ± 0.26 versus 1.05 ± 0.13 kPa, P < 0.001, respectively). Moreover, the loss modulus of hepatocellular carcinomas was significantly higher than in benign hepatocellular tumours. The storage modulus did not differ significantly between malignant and benign tumours. The area under the receiver-operating characteristic curve of loss modulus was significantly larger than that of the absolute shear modulus and storage modulus when comparing malignant and benign lesions.

Conclusions

The increased loss modulus is a better discriminator between benign and malignant tumours than the increased storage modulus or absolute value of the shear modulus.

Key Points

• Magnetic Resonance elastography is a new method of assessing the liver.

• Increased loss modulus is an indicator of malignancy in hepatic tumours.

• Loss modulus is a better discriminator than absolute shear modulus values.

• The viscoelastic properties of lesions offer promise for characterising liver tumours.

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Abbreviations

|G*|:

Absolute value of the complex-valued shear modulus

G′:

Storage modulus

G″:

Loss modulus

HCC:

Hepatocellular carcinoma

FNH:

Focal nodular hyperplasia

ICC:

Intraclass correlation coefficient

MR:

Magnetic resonance

ROI:

Region of interest

ROC:

Receiver-operating characteristics

AUROC:

Area under the receiver-operating characteristic curve

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Radiology, University Paris Diderot, Sorbonne Paris Cité, INSERM UMR 773, University Hospitals Paris Nord Val de Seine, Beaujon, 100 boulevard du Général Leclerc, 92118, Clichy Cedex, France

    Philippe Garteiser, Sabrina Doblas, Jean-Luc Daire, Mathilde Wagner, Valérie Vilgrain, Ralph Sinkus & Bernard E. Van Beers

  2. Department of Radiology, Hospital of the University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal

    Helena Leitao

Authors
  1. Philippe Garteiser
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  2. Sabrina Doblas
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  3. Jean-Luc Daire
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  4. Mathilde Wagner
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  6. Valérie Vilgrain
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  7. Ralph Sinkus
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  8. Bernard E. Van Beers
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Philippe Garteiser.

Electronic supplementary material

ESM Fig. 5

T2-weighted images, loss modulus (G″) maps and time-resolved maps of displacement in the horizontal direction of metastasis (A, D and G), HCC (B, E and H) and FNH (C, F and I). The loss modulus of HCC (2.89 kPa) is higher than that of the FNH (0.49 kPa) (PPTX 1081 kb)

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Garteiser, P., Doblas, S., Daire, JL. et al. MR elastography of liver tumours: value of viscoelastic properties for tumour characterisation. Eur Radiol 22, 2169–2177 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00330-012-2474-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00330-012-2474-6

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