Evaluation of Apparent Diffusion Coefficient (ADC) in diffusion weighted imaging of atypical vertebral hemangioma and malignant vertebral lesions

Abstract

Considering that the vertebral atypical hemangioma and vertebral malignant lesions has the same view at magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) as they are low intense on T1 weighted images, and hyper intense on T2 weighted and fat suppressed images, and considering that these two types of lesion has a very difference medical approaches. Hereby we are aimed to investigate the diagnostic value of diffusion weighted imaging (DWI) in differentiating these two type of vertebral lesions. Methods and Materials: In this cross sectional analytical study which is done at Imam Reza Hospital, Tabriz, Iran during 2015 to 2017, 23 patients with definite diagnosis of vertebral atypical hemangioma (10 patients) and vertebral malignant lesion (13 patients) entered the study. All the patients had the same imaging view on MRI. All the patients undergone DWI at the b value of 50 and 400, and the apparent diffusion co efficient (ADC) value was recorded for all patients at two groups. Results: The mean ADC value at patients with vertebral atypical hemangioma was (1888 ± 234) * 10-6 and at patients with vertebral malignant lesions was (1008 ± 293) * 10-6. The differences between the ADC value of two groups was statistically significant (p value < 10-3). The receiver operator characteristic (ROC) analysis determined that the ADC value threshold of 958*10-6 separates the vertebral atypical hemangioma from malignant lesions.