Feasibility of quantitative and volumetric enhancement measurement to assess tumor response in patients with breast cancer after early neoadjuvant chemotherapy

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the feasibility of quantitative enhancing lesion volume (ELV) for evaluating the responsiveness of breast cancer patients to early neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) using dynamic contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE-MRI). METHODS: Seventy-five women with breast cancer underwent DCE-MRI before and after NAC. Lesions were assessed by ELV, response evaluation criteria in solid tumors 1.1 (RECIST 1.1), and total lesion volume (TLV). The diagnostic and pathological predictive performances of the methods were compared and color maps were compared with pathological results. RESULTS: ELV identified 29%, 67%, and 4% of cases with partial response, stable disease, and progressive disease, respectively. There was no significant difference in evaluation performances among the methods. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value (NPV), and accuracy of ELV for predicting pathologic response were 72%, 92%, 81.8%, 86.8%, and 85.3%, respectively, with the highest sensitivity, NPV, and accuracy of the three methods. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was also highest for ELV. Pre- and post-NAC color maps reflecting tumor activity were consistent with pathological necrosis. CONCLUSIONS: ELV may help evaluate the responsiveness of breast cancer patients to NAC, and may provide a good tumor-response indicator through the ability to indicate tumor viability.