Sunday, November 30 | 10:40 a.m.-10:50 a.m. | S2-SSBR01-2 | Room S406A
A multinational team of researchers has found that incorporating the ultrafast MRI parameter time to enhancement, or TTE, into breast MRI exams improves the classification of ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) — thus reducing treatment intensity and allowing for more tailored care.
Detecting DCIS can help clinicians’ efforts to prevent invasive breast cancer, but in cases of lower-grade DCIS, this can lead to overtreatment, a group led by Carla Sitges, MD, of the Hospital Clínic Barcelona in Spain explained. That’s why classifying DCIS via imaging techniques could identify cases with “biological significance and distinguish them from indolent ones that might benefit from surveillance and avoid standard treatment,” it noted.
Sitges and colleagues conducted a study that included 160 women diagnosed with DCIS who underwent ultrafast MRI. They classified DCIS grade on a scale of one to three (low, intermediate, and high risk of recurrence).
Overall, the researchers reported a trend in which higher-grade DCIS lesions were associated with shorter TTE (p < 0.05).
“[Our] findings suggest that TTE may serve as an imaging biomarker and prognostic factor for DCIS,” they concluded.