Journal of Blood Disorders & Transfusion

Staging malignant lymphoma using 3 Tesla whole-body diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging

4^th International Conference on Blood Malignancies & Treatment

April 18-19, 2016 Dubai, UAE

Katja De Paepe

University Hospitals Leuven, Belgium

Posters & Accepted Abstracts: J Blood Disord Transfus

Abstract:

Malignant lymphoma is the sixth most common type of cancer in the Western World, accounting for 4% of all new cancers (National Cancer Institute). Accurate baseline staging is crucial to determine appropriate initial treatment as well as prognosis (Ansell, Myo Clin Proc, 2005). For this purpose, a whole body imaging technique is preferable as lymphoma can develop in any tissue�??mostly nodal, but also extranodal- and can disseminate throughout the entire body. Positron emission tomography (PET)/computed tomography (CT) is the most accurate imaging technique to stage lymphomas due to its ability to demonstrate a tumoral glucose metabolism, in contrast to conventional imaging techniques (e.g. CT) which only rely on morphological characteristics. Yet, as PET/CT is not widely accessible and potential staging discrepancies between PET/ CT and contrast enhanced (CE)-CT rarely generate treatment changes (Kostakogly), staging is still mostly performed with CE-CT. However, both methods are associated with considerable ionizing radiation doses with a risk of inducing secondary malignancies, which is of special importance in the younger lymphoma population. Recently, there has been a great interest in the application of whole body diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging (WB-MRI/DWI) as a radiation-free alternative for lymphoma staging purposes. One focus of our research is to examine whether the addition of the diffusion- weighted sequence as a functional imaging technique in combination with conventional imaging sequences might enhance the diagnostic performance of whole-body magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

Biography :

Email: katja.depaepe@uzleuven.be