Abstract #0109

Ocak I, Metzger G, McKinney Y, Bernardo M, Choyke P

Endorectal coil MRI of the prostate has been extensively studied at 1.5 T for detecting and staging prostate cancer. The potential advantage of 3.0 T MRI is higher signal to noise ratios leading to higher temporal and spatial resolution. In this study we evaluated T2-weighted, DCE-MRI images and pharmacokinetic parameters in 36 patients with biopsy proven prostate cancer with endorectal coil at 3.0 T. The combined sensitivity and specificity of T2- weighted and DCE-MRI images were 77% and 78%, respectively. Although all of the pharmacokinetic parameters were higher in biopsy proven cancer area than inflammatory and benign foci for an individual patient, there was considerable overlap in like regions across all patients. In spite of these results further investigations need to be performed on tumor pathophysiological parameters and the addition of MR spectroscopy to the T2W and DCE-MRI may further improve the results.