Differentiation of benign and malignant uterine corpus tumors by using proton MR spectroscopy at 3T: preliminary study

To retrospectively evaluate the diagnostic ability of magnetic resonance (MR) spectroscopy for distinguishing benign and malignant lesions in patients with uterine corpus tumours at MR imaging. Pelvic MR spectroscopy was performed in patients with pathologically diagnosed benign and malignant uterine corpus tumours at 3T-MR imaging. Single-voxel MR spectroscopy data were collected from a single square volume of interest that encompassed the uterine corpus lesion. The total choline compounds (tCho) resonance peak areas were quantified relative to unsuppressed water using a software package. Patients who fulfilled the criteria for estimates of acceptable reliability were included. A total of 32 patients (age range, 24-76 years) with 32 lesions were evaluated in this study. The median lesion size at MR imaging was 50 mm (range, 19-218 mm). A tCho peak was present in all 32 lesions including 14 malignant lesions (9.21 +/- 2.21 mM), and 18 benign lesions (4.59 +/- 2.22 mM) (p < 0.0001). Using a cut-off value of 7.00 mM for malignant lesions had a sensitivity of 93%, specificity of 83%, PPV of 81% and NPV of 94%. Proton MR spectroscopy with quantitative evaluation of tCho concentration can provide helpful information in distinguishing benign and malignant uterine corpus tumours.