Role of intravoxel incoherent motion MRI in diagnosis and assessment of invasiveness of urothelial bladder carcinoma

Abstract Background Urinary bladder cancer is a common malignancy. Preoperative accurate judgment of the degree of tissue invasion is crucial to determine the plan of therapy. We aimed in the current study to evaluate the role of intravoxel incoherent motion (IVIM) MRI and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) map in differentiating muscle invasive from non-muscle invasive carcinomas. Results Values of IVIM-derived true diffusion coefficient (D), pseudo-diffusion coefficient (D*) and perfusion fraction (F) and ADC were lower in muscle invasive carcinomas than non-invasive masses with p values < 0.001 and 0.001, respectively. In MIBC, ADC was (0.9 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s), D was (0.8 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s), D* was (6.9 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s) and F was (16.9%). In NMIBC, ADC was (1 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s), D was (1.1 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s), D* was (10.2 × 10 −3 mm 2 /s) and F was (17.7%). Mass D cut off values, sensitivity and specificity and AUC were < 0.9, 83.93, 96.30 and 0.945, respectively. Mass ADC cut off values, sensitivity and specificity and AUC were < 1.09, 87.50, 51.85 and 0.721, respectively. The degree of agreement between IVIM parameters and the pathological staging was assessed by Kappa test. The best agreement was detected for mass D (K = 0.796), while the mass ADC and wall beside mass D showed moderate and fair agreement (k = 0.418 and 0.325, respectively). Conclusions IVIM MRI parameters and ADC map can be utilized to detect the degree of tissue invasion caused by bladder cancer.