Diffusion-Weighted MR Imaging for the Diagnosis of Intra-Abdominal or Anal Fistula

Masatoshi Hori¹, Aytekin Oto¹, Sarah Orrin¹, Kenji Suzuki¹, Richard L. Baron¹

An intra-abdominal or anal fistula is condition which extends from a diseased intestinal segment to another organ or to the skin. MRI is increasingly thought to be an accurate and non-invasive imaging technique for the diagnosis of intra-abdominal or anal fistula. The purpose of this study was to determine whether the additional use of diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) improves detection of the disease. Our results showed that fistulae appear hyperintense on DWI. Confidence scores for lesions with DWI and T2-weighted images combined or those with Gd-enhanced images and T2-weighted images combined were statistically significantly greater than those with T2-weighted images alone.