Improving Accuracy in Measurement of Choline as a Predictor of Early Response to Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy: Correction of Internal Reference using External Reference

Yuriko Suzuki¹, Yoshifumi Kuroki², Marc Van Cauteren¹

It is important to assess the response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy for optimizing the therapy regime. Recently, in vivo proton MR spectroscopy of breast is demonstrating promising results in early assessment of response to NAC. However those methods still have limitation in quantification. A new method is presented to measure tCho concentration using internal reference more accurately, by applying the correction of tissue water content using external reference. The changes in tCho following neoadjuvant chemotherapy significantly differed between responder group and non-responder group. Our data showed that tCho is a better predictor of early response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy.