A novel software platform for volumetric assessment of ablation completeness |
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Authors: | Marco Solbiati Riccardo Muglia S. Nahum Goldberg Tiziana Ierace Alessandro Rotilio Katia M Passera |
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Affiliation: | 1. R&2. D Unit, R.A.W. Srl, Milan, Italy;3. Department of Biomedical Sciences, Humanitas University, Rozzano, Milan, Italy;4. Department of Radiology, Hadassah Hebrew University Medical Centre, Jerusalem, Israel;5. Department of Radiology, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA, USA;6. Department of Radiology, Humanitas Clinical and Research Center, Rozzano, Milan, Italy. |
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Abstract: | Purpose: To retrospectively evaluate the accuracy of a novel software platform for assessing completeness of percutaneous thermal ablations. Materials & methods: Ninety hepatocellular carcinomas (HCCs) in 50 patients receiving percutaneous ultrasound-guided microwave ablation (MWA) that resulted in apparent technical success at 24-h post-ablation computed tomography (CT) and with ≥1-year imaging follow-up were randomly selected from a 320 HCC ablation database (2010–2016). Using a novel volumetric registration software, pre-ablation CT volumes of the HCCs without and with the addition of a 5?mm safety margin, and corresponding post-ablation necrosis volumes were segmented, co-registered and overlapped. These were compared to visual side-by-side inspection of axial images. Results: At 1-year follow-up, CT showed absence of local tumor progression (LTP) in 69/90 (76.7%) cases and LTP in 21/90 (23.3%). For HCCs classified by the software as “incomplete tumor treatments”, LTP developed in 13/17 (76.5%) and all 13 (100%) of these LTPs occurred exactly where residual non-ablated tumor was identified by retrospective software analysis. HCCs classified as “complete ablation with <100% 5?mm ablative margins” had LTP in 8/49 (16.3%), while none of 24 HCCs with “complete ablation including 100% 5?mm ablative margins” had LTP. Differences in LTP between both partially ablated HCCs vs completely ablated HCCs, and ablated HCCs with <100% vs with 100% 5?mm margins were statistically significant (p?.0001 and p?=?.036, respectively). Thus, 13/21 (61.9%) incomplete tumor treatments could have been detected immediately, were the software available at the time of ablation. Conclusions: A novel software platform for volumetric assessment of ablation completeness may increase the detection of incompletely ablated tumors, thereby holding the potential to avoid subsequent recurrences. |
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Keywords: | CT 3D rendering software image processing ablation |
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