Advanced MRI in low grade gliomas
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Evaluating the role of quantitative advanced MRI techniques in comparison to conventional MRI methods in the diagnosis of low-grade brain tumours
IRAS ID
230733
Contact name
Harish Poptani
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Liverpool
Duration of Study in the UK
3 years, 0 months, 30 days
Research summary
The diagnosis of a brain tumor is typically performed using Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). To identify a slow growing (low grade) from a fast growing or malignant (high grade) brain tumor, the MRI images are also acquired after injection of a contrast dye. In general, high grade tumors appear bright due to the contrast dye accumulation while low grade tumors do not. However, this simplistic rule fails in about a third of the patients and the practicing neuroradiologist has to rely on advanced MRI methods (e.g. DWI, PWI and MRS). The addition of these advanced MRI methods adds additional time for the patient to be in the scanner as well as costs to the NHS for data acquisition as well as reporting. In addition, the data is often not analyzed quantitatively, providing only descriptive features which are difficult to reproduce.
Thus the purpose of this study is to retrospectively analyze pre-existing MRI data from non-enhancing brain tumor patients to evaluate whether quantitative analysis of this data is able to differentiate grade II (GII) and grade III (GIII) tumors. Furthermore, we will also analyze longitudinal MRI data from the patient to evaluate whether these quantitative analytic methods can identify the progression of a low-grade tumor to a high-grade tumor, as that would help future patients towards better and earlier treatment approaches.
REC name
West Midlands - Coventry & Warwickshire Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
18/WM/0045
Date of REC Opinion
6 Feb 2018
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion