Kensaku Mori1,2, Masayuki Yamaguchi2, Hirofumi Fujii2, Ryutaro Nakagami2,3, Toshihiro Furuta2,4, Manabu Minami1
1Department of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology, Graduate School of Comprehensive Human Sciences, University of Tsukuba, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan; 2Functional Imaging Division, National Cancer Center East Hospital, Kashiwa, Chiba, Japan; 3Faculty of Health Sciences, Tokyo Metropolitan University, Arakawa, Tokyo, Japan; 4Department of Radiology, Graduate School of Medicine, University of Tokyo, Bunkyo, Tokyo, Japan
The assessment of ablative margins is critical to predict the local recurrence of malignant hepatic lesions after radiofrequency ablation (RFA). The following is a method to distinguish ablative margins from tumors and non-ablated hepatic tissue. We hypothesized that if RFA is performed on the ferucarbotran-administered liver, the signal decay of the ablated liver parenchyma will be prolonged because of impaired ferucarbotran clearance. After RFA, the ablated area appeared hypointense for 4 weeks in all 4 rabbits in the ferucarbotran group and in 1 of the 3 control rabbits. The mean contrast-to-noise ratios (CNRs) significantly differed between the 2 groups.