Introduction:Existing screening investigations for the diagnosis of early prostate cancer lack specificity, resulting in a high negative biopsy rate.
There is increasing interest in the use of various magnetic resonance methods for improving the yield of transrectal ultrasound-guided biopsies of the prostate in men suspected to have prostate cancer. We review the existing status of such investigations.
Methods: A literature search was carried out using the Pubmed database to identify articles related to magnetic resonance methods for diagnosing prostate cancer. References from these articles were also extracted and reviewed.
Results: Recent studies have focused on prebiopsy magnetic resonance investigations using conventional magnetic resonance imaging, dynamic contrast enhanced magnetic resonance imaging, diffusion weighted magnetic resonance imaging, magnetization transfer imaging and magnetic resonance spectroscopy of the prostate. This marks a shift from the earlier strategy of carrying out postbiopsy magnetic resonance investigations. Prebiopsy magnetic resonance investigations has been useful in identifying patients who are more likely to have a biopsy positive for malignancy.
Conclusions: Prebiopsy magnetic resonance investigations has a potential role in increasing specificity of screening for early prostate cancer. It has a role in the targeting of biopsy sites, avoiding unnecessary biopsies and predicting the outcome of biopsies
Written by:
Kumar V, Jagannathan NR, Thulkar S, Kumar R. Are you the author?
Departments of NMR Radio-diagnosis Urology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India.
Reference: Int J Urol. 2012 Mar 21. Epub ahead of print.
doi: 10.1111/j.1442-2042.2012.02995.x
PubMed Abstract
PMID: 22435389
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