Novel radiomic analysis on bi-parametric MRI for characterizing differences between MR non-visible and visible clinically significant prostate cancer

Abstract

Backgroundaround one third of clinically significant prostate cancer (CsPCa) foci are reported to be MRI non-visible (MRI─). ObjectiveTo quantify the differences between MR visible (MRI+) and MRI─ CsPCa using intra- and peri-lesional radiomic features on bi-parametric MRI (bpMRI). MethodsThis retrospective and multi-institutional study comprised 164 patients with pre-biopsy 3T prostate multi-parametric MRI from 2014 to 2017. The MRI─ CsPCa referred to lesions with PI-RADS v2 score < 3 but ISUP grade group > 1. Three experienced radiologists were involved in annotating lesions and PI-RADS assignment. The validation set (Dv) comprised 52 patients from a single institution, the remaining 112 patients were used for training (Dt). 200 radiomic features were extracted from intra-lesional and peri-lesional regions on bpMRI.Logistic regression with least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) and 10-fold cross-validation was applied on Dt to identify radiomic features associated with MRI─ and MRI+ CsPCa to generate corresponding risk scores RMRI─ and RMRI+. RbpMRI was further generated by integrating RMRI─ and RMRI+. Statistical significance was determined using the Wilcoxon signed-rank test. ResultsBoth intra-lesional and peri-lesional bpMRI Haralick and CoLlAGe radiomic features were significantly associated with MRI─ CsPCa (p < 0.05). Intra-lesional ADC Haralick and CoLlAGe radiomic features were significantly different among MRI─ and MRI+ CsPCa (p < 0.05). RbpMRI yielded the highest AUC of 0.82 (95 % CI 0.72–0.91) compared to AUCs of RMRI+ 0.76 (95 % CI 0.63–0.89), and PI-RADS 0.58 (95 % CI 0.50–0.72) on Dv. RbpMRI correctly reclassified 10 out of 14 MRI─ CsPCa on Dv. ConclusionOur preliminary results demonstrated that both intra-lesional and peri-lesional bpMRI radiomic features were significantly associated with MRI─ CsPCa. These features could assist in CsPCa identification on bpMRI.