Diffusion Weighted Imaging in Differentiating Malignant from Benign Intraductal Papillary-Mucinous Neoplasm of the Pancreas

Atsushi Nakamoto¹, Tonsok Kim¹, Masatoshi Hori¹, Hiromitsu Onishi¹, Takahiro Tsuboyama¹, Mitsuaki Tatsumi¹, Noboru Maeda¹, Hiroki Higashihara¹, Keigo Osuga¹, Kaname Tomoda¹

We retrospectively evaluated the diagnostic performance of diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI) and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) value for differentiating malignant intraductal papillary-mucinous neoplasm (IPMN) of the pancreas from benign IPMN. The mean minimum ADC value of malignant IPMN was lower than that of benign IPMN (P < 0.001). Mean Az value, sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of MR imaging with DWI were higher than those of MR imaging without DWI, although differences were not significant. We conclude that DWI and measurement of minimum ADC value would be helpful for differentiating malignant IPMN form benign IPMN.