Doppler perfusion index and colorectal hepatic metastases: personal experience and review of the literature.

Abstract

To evaluate the role of the hepatic perfusion in the assessment of the colorectal cancer. For this research 18 patients affected by colorectal cancer were enrolled. All the patients were submitted to the evaluation of the Doppler Perfusion Index (DPI) which represents the ratio of hepatic arterial to total liver blood flow. The correlation between the evaluation of the Doppler Perfusion Index and the occurrence of the liver metastases did not show false negative but has highlighted 6 false positive, achieved a good sensitivity and very low specificity. A review of the literature and the results obtained in our study suggest that DPI may be helpful in detection of hepatic metastases.