Sodium-23 MR imaging in CNS tumours (SMIC)
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Sodium-23 MR imaging in CNS tumours(SMIC)
IRAS ID
233719
Contact name
Alan Jackson
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Manchester
Duration of Study in the UK
4 years, 8 months, 1 days
Research summary
Rapid advances in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) have revolutionized the diagnosis and management of many brain tumours. A limitation of current MRI techniques, however, is that they provide limited information on whether the underlying tumour cells are growing or responding to treatment. As such there is a pressing need for imaging techniques, which can better characterise whether a tumour is responding to treatment or not. There is growing evidence that imaging changes in tumour sodium or ‘salt’ concentration using sodium MRI may be of considerable benefit. Tumour cells have elevated sodium concentrations, and early studies using sodium MRI have shown that in many tumours there is a strong association between the measured sodium concentration and the tumour grade, ie how aggressive the tumour is. Furthermore, both animal and early small human studies using sodium MRI have shown that changes in sodium concentration can be used to monitor the growth of brain tumours, and that these changes can predict response to chemotherapy or radiotherapy treatment. The goals of this research project are therefore twofold. Firstly to evaluate if sodium MRI can be used to reliably measure the brain sodium or ‘salt’ concentration in patients with a variety of different brain tumour types. Secondly, to establish whether sodium MRI can be used in addition to more conventional MRI techniques to predict response to radiotherapy treatment in patients with two different types of brain tumour. It is hoped that the results of this study will guide further research into the future role sodium MRI may play in improving the diagnosis and clinical management of patients with brain tumours.
REC name
North West - Greater Manchester South Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
18/NW/0094
Date of REC Opinion
23 Feb 2018
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion