摘要
Objective: To evaluate the value of apparent diffusion coefficients (ADC) in Magnetic Resonance diffusion weighted imaging (MR DWI) with echo-planar technique in depicting the tumor cellularity and grading of astrocytomas. Methods: Thirty-four patients with astrocytomas(18 male, 16 female, ages from 10-73 with average of 38.41) were examined by MRI and proved by surgery and pathology, and the number of grade Ⅰ-Ⅱ (low-grade) and grade Ⅲ-Ⅳ (high-grade) is 26 and 8 respectively. ADC values of astrocytomas were determined on MR DWI. Cellularity of astrocytomas was analyzed with Adobe Photoshop 7.0 software. Results: Mean ADC values of high-grade astrocytomas(7.34±2.95)×10^-4mm^2/s were significantly different from that of lowgrade astrocytomas(13.76±3.31)×10^-4mm^2/s (t=4.913, P<0.001). Cellularity of high-grade astrocytomas (19.81±9.73)% were significantly higher than that of low-grade astrocytomas (4.74±2.96)% (t=4.32,P=0.003). ADC values of astrocytomas significantly negatively correlated with their cellularities (r=-0.535, P=0.001). Conclusion: The cellularities of astrocytomas contribute very much to ADC values in MR DWI. MR DWI is very valuable in predicting and evaluating the cellularity of astrocytomas. MR DWI might have a potential in predicting the degree of astrocytomas.
