Monoexponential, biexponential and diffusion kurtosis MR imaging models: quantitative biomarkers in the diagnosis of placenta accreta spectrum disorders

BACKGROUND: To investigate the diagnostic value of monoexponential, biexponential, and diffusion kurtosis MR imaging (MRI) in differentiating placenta accreta spectrum (PAS) disorders. METHODS: A total of 65 patients with PAS disorders and 27 patients with normal placentas undergoing conventional DWI, IVIM, and DKI were retrospectively reviewed. The mean, minimum, and maximum parameters including the apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) and exponential ADC (eADC) from standard DWI, diffusion kurtosis (MK), and mean diffusion coefficient (MD) from DKI and pure diffusion coefficient (D), pseudo-diffusion coefficient (D*), and perfusion fraction (f) from IVIM were measured from the volumetric analysis and compared between patients with PAS disorders and patients with normal placentas. Univariate and multivariated logistic regression analyses were used to evaluate the value of the above parameters for differentiating PAS disorders. Receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curve analyses were used to evaluate the diagnostic efficiency of different diffusion parameters for predicting PAS disorders. RESULTS: Multivariate analysis demonstrated that only D mean and D max differed significantly among all the studied parameters for differentiating PAS disorders when comparisons between accreta lesions in patients with PAS (AP) and whole placentas in patients with normal placentas (WP-normal) were performed (all p < 0.05). For discriminating PAS disorders, a combined use of these two parameters yielded an AUC of 0.93 with sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of 83.08, 88.89, and 83.70%, respectively. CONCLUSION: The diagnostic performance of the parameters from accreta lesions was better than that of the whole placenta. D mean and D max were associated with PAS disorders. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12884-022-04644-9.