Unclear tumor border in magnetic resonance imaging as a prognostic factor of squamous cell cervical cancer

Abstract

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is used for pretreatment staging in cervical cancer. In the present study, we used pretreatment images to categorize operative cases into two groups and evaluated their prognosis. A total of 53 cervical cancer patients with squamous cell carcinoma who underwent radical hysterectomy were included in this study. Based on MRI, the patients were classified into two groups, namely clear and unclear tumor border. For each patient, the following characteristics were evaluated: overall survival; recurrence-free survival; lymph node metastasis; lymphovascular space invasion; and pathological findings, including immunohistochemical analysis of vimentin. The clear and unclear tumor border groups included 40 and 13 patients, respectively. Compared with the clear tumor border group, the unclear tumor border group was associated with higher incidence rates of recurrence (3/40 vs. 3/13, respectively), lymphovascular space invasion (24/40 vs. 13/13, respectively), lymph node metastasis (6/40 vs. 10/13, respectively), and positivity for vimentin (18/40 vs. 10/13, respectively). Despite the absence of significant difference in recurrence-free survival (p = 0.0847), the unclear tumor border group had a significantly poorer overall survival versus the clear tumor border group (p = 0.0062). According to MRI findings, an unclear tumor border in patients with squamous cell cervical cancer is linked to poorer prognosis, lymph node metastasis, and distant recurrence of metastasis.