Exploration of an optimal ROI measurement for predicting tumor and node stage in rectal adenocarcinoma using 3D CEST-MRI

Three dimensional chemical exchange saturation transfer (3D-CEST) can provide some quantitative values, such as amide proton transfer weighted-signal intensity (APTw-SI) and magnetization transfer (MT). Different ROI approaches (ss-ROI: single slice ROI; ts-ROI: three-slice ROI; wt-ROI: whole-tumor ROI ) affected the clinic feasibility of APTw-SI and MT in predicting tumor and node (TN) staging. We found MT assisted TN staging of RA patients with a good AUC for all three ROI approaches. Furthermore, MT with ss-ROI is easier to perform in clinical work than ts-ROI and wt-ROI and can be used for clinical diagnosis in the future.