Hepatic micrometastases in the rat: ferrite-enhanced MR imaging.
A rat tumor model was used to evaluate the ability of ferrite-enhanced magnetic resonance (MR) imaging to demonstrate hepatic metastases smaller than 1 cm. Twenty-eight rat livers were inoculated with 5 X 10(5) mammary carcinoma cells and imaged with a 0.6-T MR system. Non-enhanced and ferrite-enhanced images were analyzed and correlated with autopsy findings for each rat. Lesion detection rates correlated closely with cancer-to-liver contrast-to-noise ratios. Ferrite-enhanced MR imaging demonstrated significantly more lesions than non-enhanced imaging (P less than .05) and decreased the threshold size for lesion detectability (less than 2 mm). Ferrite also enabled more accurate measurements of the lesions (r = .96).
Tsang
Y M
YM
Medical College and Hospital, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Republic of China.
Stark
D D
DD
Chen
M C
MC
Weissleder
R
R
Wittenberg
J
J
Ferrucci
J T
JT
D000818:Animals; D005260:Female; D005290:Ferric Compounds; D008114:Liver Neoplasms, Experimental / Q000175:diagnosis*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D008325:Mammary Neoplasms, Experimental; D009368:Neoplasm Transplantation; D051381:Rats
D005290:Ferric Compounds; C001215:ferrite