Restriction Spectrum Imaging with MRI Used to Predict Prostate Cancer Tumor Grade

The new imaging tool could help clinicians distinguish between benign or low-grade tumors, and aggressive prostate cancer and guide treatment, and biopsy procedures.

The researchers from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine (UCSD; San Diego, CA, USA) published the results of the study online in the June 1, 2016, issue of the journal Clinical Cancer Research. According to the researchers Restricted Spectrum Imaging – Magnetic Resonance Imaging (RSI-MRI) can correct for magnetic field distortions.

The researchers enlisted 10 patients for the study and evaluated more than 2,700 discrete data points. The researchers concluded that RSI-MRI could be used as a stand-alone, non-contrast screening tool in the future. An RSI-MRI scan would take only 15 minutes while a standard contrast-enhanced exam today takes between 40 minutes and an hour. Early diagnosis of prostate cancer is crucial to help improve the prognosis of a patient.

Senior author of the study David S. Karow, MD, PhD, assistant professor of radiology at the UCSD, said, “Noninvasive imaging is used to detect disease, but RSI-MRI takes it a step further. We can predict the grade of a tumor sometimes without a biopsy of the prostate tissue. This is taking all that’s good about multi-parametric MRI and making it better. The addition of RSI to a pelvic MRI added between 2.5 to 5 minutes to scanning time making it a fast and highly accurate tool with decreased risk compared to contrast MRI which involves injecting patients with dye.”

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University of California, San Diego School of Medicine