Abstract
Background: To provide evident data regarding relationships between quantitative dynamic contrast enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE MRI) and prognostic factors in breast cancer (BC).Methods: Data from 4 centers (200 female patients, mean age, 51.2 ± 11.5 years) were acquired. The following data were collected: histopathological diagnosis, tumor grade, stage, hormone receptor status, KI 67, and DCE MRI values including Ktrans (volume transfer constant), Ve (volume of the extravascular extracellular leakage space (EES) and Kep (diffusion of contrast medium from the EES back to the plasma). DCE MRI values between different groups were compared using the Mann–Whitney U test and by the Kruskal-Wallis H test. The association between DCE MRI and Ki 67 values was calculated by Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient. Results: DCE MRI values of different tumor subtypes overlapped significantly. There were no statistically significant differences of DCE MRI values between different tumor grades. All DCE MRI parameters correlated with KI 67: Ktrans, r = 0.44, p=0.0001; Ve, r = 0.34, p=0.0001; Kep, r = 0.28, p=0.002. ROC analysis identified a Ktrans threshold of 0.3 min-1 for discrimination of tumors with low KI 67 expression (<25%) and high KI 67 expression (≥25%): sensitivity, 75.5%, specificity, 73.0%, accuracy, 74.0%, AUC, 0.78. DCE MRI values overlapped between tumors with different T and N stages.Conclusion: Ktrans, Kep, and Ve cannot be used as reliable a surrogate marker for hormone receptor status, tumor stage and grade in BC. Ktrans may discriminate lesions with high and lower proliferation activity.
Radiomic analysis reveals DCE-MRI features for prediction of molecular subtypes of breast cancer