Tomohiro Namimoto1, Kazuo Awai1, Takeshi Nakaura1, Yumi Yanaga1, Shinichi Nakamura1, Tetsuo Saito2, Toshinori Hirai1, Yasuyuki Yamashita1
1Diagnostic Radiology, Kumamoto Universtiy, Kumamoto, Japan; 2Radiation Oncology, Kumamoto Universtiy, Kumamoto, Japan
The purpose of our study is to determine the usefulness of diffusion weighted (DW) imaging in the characterization of ovarian cystic masses and to clarify the relationship between the signal intensity in T2-weighted imaging and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) values at 3T MRI. Our study showed ADC values of endometrial cysts and mature cystic teratomas were significantly lower than those of other cystic lesions. However, the usefulness of the ADC values for differentiating benign from malignant cystic ovarian lesions was limited due to an influence from signal intensity of T2-weighted images with fat suppression.