DCE-MRI at 3T in Patients with Hepatocellular Carcinoma Using a Saturation-Prepared Dual-Acquisition Pulse Sequence

Andrew B. Gill¹, David J. Bowden¹, Richard T. Black¹, Andrew N. Priest¹, Ilse Joubert¹, Martin J. Graves¹, David J. Lomas¹

This pilot study investigated the ability of DCE-MRI indices to differentiate between tumour and unaffected regions in the livers of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma. Data was collected from 6 patients and 9 healthy volunteers using a saturation-prepared dual-acquisition sequence, and analysed with a dual-input single-compartment pharmacokinetic model. The arterial fraction was found to be significantly higher in tumour tissue than in unaffected tissue and significantly higher than that in volunteers. Mean total perfusion was found to be lower in tumours than in the livers of volunteers, probably due to the degree of necrosis in the tumour central regions.