J Korean Soc Magn Reson Med.  2008 Jun;12(1):1-7.

MRI Evaluation for the Histologic Components of Soft-tissue Tumors: Comparison of MEDIC and Fast SE T2-weighted Imaging

• Moon TY
• Lee IS
• Lee JW
• Choi KU
• Kim JI
• Kim EE

Abstract

PURPOSE: To compare Multi Echo Data Image Combination (MEDIC) and fast SE T2- weighted images with fat saturation (T2FS) to suggest more accurate evaluation of the histologic components of soft-tissue tumors.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
The experimental group included 25 histologic tissues (5 vascular, 4 neural, 4 fibrous, 4 hypercellular, 2 hemorrhagic necroses, 2 cystic, 2 lipoid, 1 myxoid stroma, and 1 thrombus) in 10 patients who had pathologically confirmed schwannoma (n = 3), hemangioma (n = 2), lipoma (n = 1), angiokeratoma (n = 1), synovial sarcoma (n = 1), liposarcoma (n = 1), and malignant fibrous histiocytoma (n = 1). The inhomogeneity values were measured using the standard deviation value (SD) divided by the mean value as SD presents an error amount similar to that of imaging heterogeneity.
RESULTS
The inhomogeneity values of 25 histologic components were lower on MEDIC than those on T2FS (p < .001).
CONCLUSION
We conclude that MEDIC is more accurate than T2FS for evaluating the tissue components of soft-tissue tumors using digitalized data because MEDIC images have far lower inhomogeneity.

Keyword

MR, musculoskeletal system; MR, soft-tissue tumors; MEDIC

MeSH Terms

Angiokeratoma
Hemangioma
Histiocytoma, Malignant Fibrous
Humans
Lipoma
Liposarcoma
Necrosis
Neurilemmoma
Sarcoma, Synovial