Liver tumor characterization: comparison between liver-specific gadoxetic acid disodium-enhanced MRI and biphasic CT--a multicenter trial.
OBJECTIVE
In our multi center trial we compared the potentials of biphasic contrast-enhanced computed tomography (CT) and a novel tissue-specific magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) contrast agent gadoxetic acid disodium in liver lesion characterization.


METHODS
A total of 176 patients with 252 liver lesions were analyzed. There were 104 malignant and 148 benign lesions. High-field strength (1.0 T or 1.5 T) MR systems with T1-and T2-weighted sequences were used with and without fat suppression. After gadoxetic acid disodium injection, dynamic imaging and hepatocyte phase MR imaging were performed. Biphasic with 150 mg I/kg of body weight (100-200 mL) spiral CT was also performed. Image reading consisted of on-site (by study investigators) and fully blinded off-site (by E.S.P; C.R; and A.S) evaluations. The classification (benign or malignant) and characterization (lesion type) outcomes of both techniques were assessed. All imaging results were verified against a standard of reference.


RESULTS
Both on-site and off-site evaluations demonstrated increases in the lesion classification accuracy with gadoxetic acid disodium-enhanced MRI when compared with spiral CT. This improvement was also shown for characterization. Gadoxetic acid disodium was well tolerated.


CONCLUSIONS
Gadoxetic acid disodium offers a safe and diagnostically powerful tool for the evaluation of patients with focal liver lesions with a reliable assessment of lesion classification and characterization.
Halavaara
Juha
J
Jorvi Hospital, Department of Radiology, Espoo, Finland. juha.halavaara@hus.fi
Breuer
Josy
J
Ayuso
Carmen
C
Balzer
Thomas
T
Bellin
Marie-France
MF
Blomqvist
Lennart
L
Carter
Rick
R
Grazioli
Luigi
L
Hammerstingl
Renate
R
Huppertz
Alexander
A
Jung
Gregor
G
Krause
Denis
D
Laghi
Andrea
A
Leen
Edward
E
Lupatelli
Luciano
L
Marsili
Luca
L
Martin
Julio
J
Pretorius
E Scott
ES
Reinhold
Caroline
C
Stiskal
Michael
M
Stolpen
Alan H
AH
D019786:Gadolinium DTPA; D006801:Humans; D008107:Liver Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis; D008113:Liver Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D036542:Tomography, Spiral Computed / Q000379:methods*
C073590:gadolinium ethoxybenzyl DTPA; D019786:Gadolinium DTPA