Performance evaluation of 4 measuring methods of ground-glass opacities for predicting the 5-year relapse-free survival of patients with peripheral nonsmall cell lung cancer: a multicenter study.
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the performance of 4 methods of measuring the extent of ground-glass opacities as a means of predicting the 5-year relapse-free survival of patients with peripheral nonsmall cell lung cancer (NSLC).


METHODS
Ground-glass opacities on thin-section computed tomographic images of 120 peripheral NSLCs were measured at 7 medical institutions by the length, area, modified length, and vanishing ratio (VR) methods. The performance (Az) of each method in predicting the 5-year relapse-free survival was evaluated using receiver operating characteristic analysis.


RESULTS
The mean Az value obtained by the length, area, modified length, and VR methods in the receiver operating characteristic analyses was 0.683, 0.702, 0.728, and 0.784, respectively. The differences between the mean Az value obtained by the VR method and by the other 3 methods were significant.


CONCLUSIONS
Vanishing ratio method was the most accurate predictor of the 5-year relapse-free survival of patients with peripheral NSLC.
Kakinuma
Ryutaro
R
National Cancer Hospital East, Kashiwa, Chiba, Japan. rkaki@ncc.go.jp
Kodama
Ken
K
Yamada
Kouzo
K
Yokoyama
Akira
A
Adachi
Shuji
S
Mori
Kiyoshi
K
Fukuyama
Yasuro
Y
Fukuda
Yasuro
Y
Kuriyama
Keiko
K
Oda
Junichi
J
Oda
Junji
J
Noguchi
Masayuki
M
Matsuno
Yoshihiro
Y
Yokose
Tomoyuki
T
Ohmatsu
Hironobu
H
Nishiwaki
Yutaka
Y
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002289:Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000401:mortality*; D018572:Disease-Free Survival; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008168:Lung / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D008175:Lung Neoplasms / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000401:mortality*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012372:ROC Curve; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed