A histogram analysis of diffusion and perfusion features of cervical cancer based on intravoxel incoherent motion magnetic resonance imaging

Objective: To evaluate the diagnostic potential based on histogram analysis of IVIM parameters between uterine cervical cancers (CC) - normal myometrium (Myo) versus CC - gluteus maximus muscle (GM) and to study the feasibility of histogram analysis of IVIM parameters to differentiate the early from locally advanced stage CCs. Methods: 64 patients with pathologically confirmed CC were enrolled. Histogram indices mean, median, 25th, and partial derivative 75th percentile of apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC), true diffusion coefficient (D), pseudo-diffusion coefficient (D*), and perfusion fraction (f) value of entire tumor were statistically analyzed and compared between CC - GM versus CC - Myo, as well as between early and locally advanced stage CCs. A multivariate analysis was performed to identify indices that could best distinguish early from locally advanced stage CC. Receiver operating characteristic curves (ROC) were used to evaluate the diagnostic efficiency of every histogram parameter. Results: All the tested histogram indices significantly differed between the patients with CC - GM vs. CC - Myo, nonetheless, CC - GM yielded higher range area under the curve (AUC) value of 0.8-0.99 vs. 0.6-0.99. The additional significant difference was found among all the tested histogram indices of D*, mean, median, and 75th percentile off, mean and 75th percentile of ADC, and 75th percentile of D discriminating early from locally advanced CCs. ROC curves indicated that the 75th percentile of D* value 28.17 x 10(-3) mm(2)/s could best differentiate early from locally advanced stage CCs, with AUC of 0.776. In the multivariate analysis, ROC indicated the 50th percentile of D* and f was the most significant with AUCs of 0.856. Conclusions: The histogram analysis of IVIM parameters depicted that gluteus maximus served better reference tissue in comparison to myometrium. The histogram index 75th percentile of ADC, D, D*, and f may serve a diagnostic biomarker to differentiate the early from locally advanced stage CCs.