Understanding the Remarkable Stability of Well-Defined Dinuclear Copper(I) Carbene Complexes.

The synthesis of a well-defined dicopper carbene complex supported by the PNNP (2,7-bis(di-tert-butylphosphaneyl)methyl-1,8-naphthyridine) expanded pincer ligand is reported. This carbene complex is remarkably stable, even in the presence of air and water. The reactivity of this complex was explored towards typical carbene transfer substrates and its electronic structure was investigated. Using a combination of experiments and DFT calculations, the principles that underly the stability of dinuclear carbene complexes are probed.

The importance of integrating diagnostic modalities in patient selection for CRS-HIPEC in colorectal peritoneal metastases.

BACKGROUND: Despite thorough preoperative work-up for cytoreductive surgery and hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (CRS-HIPEC), so called open-close (OC) procedures as a result of irresectable disease remain common. Currently, diagnostic laparoscopy (DLS) is considered the gold standard, and consequently overrules the results of computed tomography (CT) scans; however, certain regions of the abdomen are difficult to assess and postoperative adhesion formation may further compromise staging during DLS. PURPOSE: To determine whether better clinical assessment could be achieved by combining the results of DLS and preoperative CT scans during a multidisciplinary team (MDT) meeting. MATERIAL AND METHODS: All patients who were eligible for CRS-HIPEC after DLS, but eventually underwent an OC procedure between 2010 and 2018 were selected. Radiological reassessment of CT scans was performed and combined with assessment of the DLS during a MDT meeting. The MDT was blinded for the outcome of the procedure (OC vs. CRS-HIPEC). RESULTS: The majority of the OC procedures (69%) was correctly predicted by the MDT. In most patients (88%), this conclusion was based on the combination of the radiological and surgical peritoneal cancer index (PCI). CT was particularly accurate for detection of larger tumor deposits in the abdominal regions, as 84%-86% was detected. Assessment of lesions in the small bowel regions is troublesome; 72% of lesions are missed on the preoperative CT scan. CONCLUSIONS: A combination of radiological and surgical assessment of the PCI may lead to improved preoperative patient selection for CRS-HIPEC.

Abandonment of Routine Radiotherapy for Nonlocally Advanced Rectal Cancer and Oncological Outcomes.

Importance: Neoadjuvant short-course radiotherapy was routinely applied for nonlocally advanced rectal cancer (cT1-3N0-1M0 with >1 mm distance to the mesorectal fascia) in the Netherlands following the Dutch total mesorectal excision trial. This policy has shifted toward selective application after guideline revision in 2014. Objective: To determine the association of decreased use of neoadjuvant radiotherapy with cancer-related outcomes and overall survival at a national level. Design, Setting, and Participants: This multicenter, population-based, nationwide cross-sectional cohort study analyzed Dutch patients with rectal cancer who were treated in 2011 with a 4-year follow-up. A similar study was performed in 2021, analyzing all patients that were surgically treated in 2016. From these cohorts, all patients with cT1-3N0-1M0 rectal cancer and radiologically unthreatened mesorectal fascia were included in the current study. The data of the 2011 cohort were collected between May and October 2015, and the data of the 2016 cohort were collected between October 2020 and November 2021. The data were analyzed between May and October 2022. Main Outcomes and Measures: The main outcomes were 4-year local recurrence and overall survival rates. Results: Among the 2011 and 2016 cohorts, 1199 (mean [SD] age, 68 [11] years; 430 women [36%]) of 2095 patients (57.2%) and 1576 (mean [SD] age, 68 [10] years; 547 women [35%]) of 3057 patients (51.6%) had cT1-3N0-1M0 rectal cancer and were included, with proportions of neoadjuvant radiotherapy of 87% (2011) and 37% (2016). Four-year local recurrence rates were 5.8% and 5.5%, respectively (P = .99). Compared with the 2011 cohort, 4-year overall survival was significantly higher in the 2016 cohort (79.6% vs 86.4%; P < .001), with lower non-cancer-related mortality (13.8% vs 6.3%; P < .001). Conclusions and Relevance: The results of this cross-sectional study suggest that an absolute 50% reduction in radiotherapy use for nonlocally advanced rectal cancer did not compromise cancer-related outcomes at a national level. Optimizing clinical staging and surgery following the Dutch total mesorectal excision trial has potentially enabled safe deintensification of treatment.

Evaluation of National Surgical Practice for Lateral Lymph Nodes in Rectal Cancer in an Untrained Setting.

BACKGROUND: Involved lateral lymph nodes (LLNs) have been associated with increased local recurrence (LR) and ipsi-lateral LR (LLR) rates. However, consensus regarding the indication and type of surgical treatment for suspicious LLNs is lacking. This study evaluated the surgical treatment of LLNs in an untrained setting at a national level. METHODS: Patients who underwent additional LLN surgery were selected from a national cross-sectional cohort study regarding patients undergoing rectal cancer surgery in 69 Dutch hospitals in 2016. LLN surgery consisted of either 'node-picking' (the removal of an individual LLN) or 'partial regional node dissection' (PRND; an incomplete resection of the LLN area). For all patients with primarily enlarged (≥7 mm) LLNs, those undergoing rectal surgery with an additional LLN procedure were compared to those  undergoing only rectal resection. RESULTS: Out of 3057 patients, 64 underwent additional LLN surgery, with 4-year LR and LLR rates of 26% and 15%, respectively. Forty-eight patients (75%) had enlarged LLNs, with corresponding recurrence rates of 26% and 19%, respectively. Node-picking (n = 40) resulted in a 20% 4-year LLR, and a 14% LLR after PRND (n = 8; p = 0.677). Multivariable analysis of 158 patients with enlarged LLNs undergoing additional LLN surgery (n = 48) or rectal resection alone (n = 110) showed no significant association of LLN surgery with 4-year LR or LLR, but suggested higher recurrence risks after LLN surgery (LR: hazard ratio [HR] 1.5, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.7-3.2, p = 0.264; LLR: HR 1.9, 95% CI 0.2-2.5, p = 0.874). CONCLUSION: Evaluation of Dutch practice in 2016 revealed that approximately one-third of patients with primarily enlarged LLNs underwent surgical treatment, mostly consisting of node-picking. Recurrence rates were not significantly affected by LLN surgery, but did suggest worse outcomes. Outcomes of LLN surgery after adequate training requires further research.

Automatic detection of actionable findings and communication mentions in radiology reports using natural language processing.

OBJECTIVES: To develop and validate classifiers for automatic detection of actionable findings and documentation of nonroutine communication in routinely delivered radiology reports. METHODS: Two radiologists annotated all actionable findings and communication mentions in a training set of 1,306 radiology reports and a test set of 1,000 reports randomly selected from the electronic health record system of a large tertiary hospital. Various feature sets were constructed based on the impression section of the reports using different preprocessing steps (stemming, removal of stop words, negations, and previously known or stable findings) and n-grams. Random forest classifiers were trained to detect actionable findings, and a decision-rule classifier was trained to find communication mentions. Classifier performance was evaluated by the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC), sensitivity, and specificity. RESULTS: On the training set, the actionable finding classifier with the highest cross-validated performance was obtained for a feature set of unigrams, after stemming and removal of negated, known, and stable findings. On the test set, this classifier achieved an AUC of 0.876 (95% CI 0.854-0.898). The classifier for communication detection was trained after negation removal, using unigrams as features. The resultant decision rule had a sensitivity of 0.841 (95% CI 0.706-0.921) and specificity of 0.990 (95% CI 0.981-0.994) on the test set. CONCLUSIONS: Automatic detection of actionable findings and subsequent communication in routinely delivered radiology reports is possible. This can serve quality control purposes and may alert radiologists to the presence of actionable findings during reporting. KEY POINTS: • Classifiers were developed for automatic detection of the broad spectrum of actionable findings and subsequent communication mentions in routinely delivered radiology reports. • Straightforward report preprocessing and simple feature sets can produce well-performing classifiers. • The resultant classifiers show good performance for detection of actionable findings and excellent performance for detection of communication mentions.

Assessment of actionable findings in radiology reports.

PURPOSE: The American College of Radiology (ACR) Actionable Reporting Work Group defined three categories of imaging findings that require additional, nonroutine communication with the referring physician because of their urgency or unexpectedness. The objective of this study was to determine the prevalence of actionable findings in radiology reports, and to assess how well radiologists agree on the categorisation of actionable findings. METHOD: From 124,909 consecutive radiology reports stored in the electronic health record system of a large university hospital, 1000 reports were randomly selected. Two radiologists independently annotated all actionable findings according to the three categories of urgency defined by the ACR Work Group. Annotation differences were resolved in a consensus meeting and a final category was established for each report. Interannotator agreement was measured by accuracy and the kappa coefficient. RESULTS: The prevalence of the three categories of actionable findings together was 32.5 %. Of all reports, 10.9 % were from patients seen in the emergency department. Prevalence of actionable findings for these patients (45.9 %) was considerably higher than for patients in routine clinical care (30.9 %). Interannotator agreement scores on the categorisation of actionable findings were 0.812 for accuracy and 0.616 for kappa coefficient. CONCLUSIONS: The prevalence of actionable findings in radiology reports is high. The interannotator agreement scores are moderate, indicating that categorisation of actionable findings is a difficult task. To avoid unneeded increase in the workload of radiologists, in particular in routine practice, clinical context may need to be considered in deciding whether a finding is actionable.

Performance of Contrast-Enhanced Sonography Versus MRI With a Liver-Specific Contrast Agent for Diagnosis of Hepatocellular Adenoma and Focal Nodular Hyperplasia.

OBJECTIVE. The purpose of this article is to compare contrast-enhanced sonography (CEUS) with sulfur hexafluoride with MRI with the liver-specific contrast agent gadobenate dimeglumine in the diagnosis of hepatocellular adenoma (HCA) and focal nodular hyperplasia (FNH) in a cohort of consecutive patients. MATERIALS AND METHODS. Patients referred to a tertiary center for hepatobiliary disease who had suspected HCA or FNH on MRI performed with an extracellular gadolinium-based contrast agent underwent a prospective workup including CEUS and MRI with a liver-specific contrast agent. Diagnosis was definite when the findings of CEUS and MRI with a liver-specific contrast agent were concordant; histopathologic examination (HPE) was performed for cases with discordant findings. Descriptive statistics and the association between categoric variables were presented as numbers and percentages and were assessed using the Fisher exact test. The primary analysis was patient based. Sensitivity, specificity, and AUC and predictive values for the diagnosis of HCA and FNH were calculated separately for CEUS and MRI with a liver-specific contrast agent. RESULTS. A total of 181 patients were selected for the first analysis. Findings from CEUS and MRI with a liver-specific contrast agent were concordant for 132 patients (73%) and discordant for 49 (27%). HPE was performed for 26 of the 49 patients with discordant findings (53%), with findings indeterminate for two of these patients, the findings of MRI with a liver-specific contrast agent correct for 21 of the remaining 24 patients (87.5%), and the findings of CEUS correct for three of these 24 patients (12.5%) (p < 0.05). For further analysis, 156 patients with concordant findings or HPE-proven cases were included. For CEUS, the sensitivity and specificity for the diagnosis of HCA and FNH were 85% and 87%, respectively; the ROC AUC value was 0.856; and the positive predictive value and negative predictive value were 79% and 90%, respectively. For MRI with a liver-specific contrast agent, the sensitivity and specificity were 95% each, the ROC AUC value was 0.949, and the positive predictive value and negative predictive value were 92% and 97%, respectively, for the diagnosis of HCA and FNH. CONCLUSION. The findings of CEUS and MRI with a liver-specific contrast agent showed fair agreement for the diagnosis of HCA and FNH. MRI with a liver-specific contrast agent is diagnostically correct significantly more often than CEUS in cases with discordant findings that are HPE proven.

Sarcopenia/Muscle Mass is not a Prognostic Factor for Short- and Long-Term Outcome After Esophagectomy for Cancer.

BACKGROUND: Recent studies have suggested that sarcopenia is a prognostic risk indicator of postoperative complications and predicts survival in cancer patients. The aim of this study is to investigate whether sarcopenia is associated with postoperative short-term outcome (morbidity and mortality) and long-term survival in patients undergoing esophagectomy for cancer after neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy. METHODS: All patients who underwent neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy followed by esophagectomy for cancer, and of whom an adequate CT scan was available, were included in the current study. The presence of sarcopenia was defined by CT imaging using cut-off values of the total cross-sectional muscle tissue measured transversely at the third lumbar level. RESULTS: A total number of 120 patients were eligible for analysis. Almost half of the patients (N = 54, 45 %) were classified as having sarcopenia; 24 sarcopenic patients (44 %) had overweight and 5 sarcopenic patients (9 %) were obese. Overall morbidity and mortality rate did not differ significantly between sarcopenic and non-sarcopenic patients, nor did long-term overall or disease-free survival. Also sarcopenic obesity was not associated with worse outcome. CONCLUSION: The presence of sarcopenia was not associated with a negative short- and long-term outcome in this selected group of esophageal cancer patients after neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy followed by esophagectomy.

Value of Magnetic Resonance Cholangiopancreatography in Assessment of Nonanastomotic Biliary Strictures After Liver Transplantation.

UNLABELLED: Nonanastomotic biliary strictures (NAS) remain a frequent complication after orthotopic liver transplantation (OLT). The aim of this study was to evaluate whether magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography (MRCP) could be used to detect NAS and to grade the severity of biliary strictures. METHODS: In total, 58 patients after OLT from 2 Dutch transplantation centers in whom endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography or percutaneous transhepatic cholangiography and MRCP were performed within less than 6 months apart were included in the study. Of these patients, 41 had NAS and 17 were without NAS based on endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography or percutaneous transhepatic cholangiography and follow-up. Four radiologists-2 from each center-used an adapted validated classification-termed "Leiden Biliary Stricture Classification" "(LBSC)-to evaluate the MRCP examinations independently. In this classification, NAS severity is assessed in 4 hepatobiliary regions. Interobserver agreement of the severity score for each region was calculated with the κ statistics. RESULTS: Optimal cutoff value of the LBSC to detect the presence of NAS with MRCP was calculated at 3 points or greater for all readers. Applying this cutoff sensitivity for each reader was greater than 90%, with a specificity of 50% to 82%, positive predictive value of 86% to 91%, and negative predictive value of 80% to 100%. The MRCP performance was better in evaluation of the intrahepatic than of the extrahepatic bile ducts. The additional value of MRCP for grading severity of NAS was limited. CONCLUSIONS: The MRCP with the LBSC is a reliable tool to detect or exclude NAS after OLT. Currently, MRCP cannot be used to reliably grade the severity of these strictures.

Genotype-phenotype correlations in hepatocellular adenoma: an update of MRI findings.

Hepatocellular adenoma (HCA) is a generally benign liver tumor with the potential for malignancy and bleeding. HCAs are categorized into four subtypes on the basis of genetic and pathological features: hepatocyte nuclear factor 1α-mutated HCA, ß-catenin-mutated HCA, inflammatory HCA, and unclassified HCA. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) plays an important role in the diagnosis, subtype characterization, and detection of HCA complications; it is also used to differentiate HCA from focal nodular hyperplasia. In this review, we present an overview of the genetic abnormalities, oncogenesis, and typical and atypical MRI findings of specific subtypes of HCA using contrast-enhanced MRI with or without hepatobiliary contrast agents (gadobenate dimeglumine and gadoxetate disodium). We also discuss their different management implications after diagnosis.

COPD exacerbations in general practice: variability in oral prednisolone courses.

BACKGROUND: The use of oral corticosteroids as treatment of COPD exacerbations in primary care is well established and evidence-based. However, the most appropriate dosage regimen has not been determined and remains controversial. Corticosteroid therapy is associated with a number of undesirable side effects, including hyperglycaemias, so differences in prescribing might be relevant. This study examines the differences between GPs in dosage and duration of prednisolone treatment in patients with a COPD exacerbation. It also investigates the number of general practitioners (GPs) who adjust their treatment according to the presence of diabetic co-morbidity. METHODS: Cross-sectional study among 219 GPs and 25 GPs in training, located in the Northern part of the Netherlands. RESULTS: The response rate was 69%. Nearly every GP prescribed a continuous dose of prednisolone 30 mg per day. Among GPs there were substantial differences in treatment duration. GPs prescribed courses of five, seven, ten, or fourteen days. A course of seven days was most common. The duration of treatment depended on exacerbation and disease severity. A course of five days was especially prescribed in case of a less severe exacerbation. In a more severe exacerbation duration of seven to fourteen days was more common. Hardly any GP adjusted treatment to the presence of diabetic co-morbidity. CONCLUSION: Under normal conditions GPs prescribe prednisolone quite uniformly, within the range of the current Dutch guidelines. There is insufficient guidance regarding how to adjust corticosteroid treatment to exacerbation severity, disease severity and the presence of diabetic co-morbidity. Under these circumstances, there is a substantial variation in treatment duration.

Multicenter randomized controlled trial of the costs and effects of noninvasive diagnostic imaging in patients with peripheral arterial disease: the DIPAD trial.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of our study was to compare the costs and effects of three noninvasive imaging tests as the initial imaging test in the diagnostic workup of patients with peripheral arterial disease. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Of 984 patients assessed for eligibility, 514 patients with peripheral arterial disease were randomized to MR angiography (MRA) or duplex sonography in three hospitals and to MRA or CT angiography (CTA) in one hospital. The outcome measures included the clinical utility, functional patient outcomes, quality of life, and actual diagnostic and therapeutic costs related to the initial imaging test during 6 months of follow-up. RESULTS: With adjustment for potentially predictive baseline variables, the learning curve, and hospital setting, a significantly higher confidence and less additional imaging were found for MRA and CTA compared with duplex sonography. No statistically significant differences were found in improvement in functional patient outcomes and quality of life among the groups. The total costs were significantly higher for MRA and duplex sonography than for CTA. CONCLUSION: The results suggest that both CTA and MRA are clinically more useful than duplex sonography and that CTA leads to cost savings compared with both MRA and duplex sonography in the initial imaging evaluation of peripheral arterial disease.

Peripheral arterial disease: clinical and cost comparisons between duplex US and contrast-enhanced MR angiography--a multicenter randomized trial.

PURPOSE: To prospectively determine the clinical and economic consequences of replacing duplex ultrasonography (US) with contrast material-enhanced magnetic resonance (MR) angiography for the initial imaging work-up of patients with peripheral arterial disease (PAD). MATERIALS AND METHODS: This randomized multicenter study was approved by the institutional review board of each hospital, and all patients signed written informed consent prior to randomization. Patients with PAD who needed to undergo imaging work-up and who had an ankle-brachial pressure index (ABPI) of less than 0.90 were recruited by vascular surgeons between January 2002 and September 2003. Patients were randomly assigned to undergo contrast-enhanced MR angiography or duplex US. The primary outcome measure was cost. Secondary outcome measures included therapeutic confidence, changes in disease severity, and changes in quality of life (QOL) assessed during 6 months of follow-up. Indicators for disease severity were based on the Rutherford classification, treadmill walking distance, ABPI at rest, and ABPI after exercise. QOL was assessed with the Rating Scale, Short Form 36, EuroQol-5D, and VascuQol questionnaires. The cost of (additional) imaging procedures, therapeutic interventions, and outpatient visits were calculated from a hospital perspective (ie, all costs incurred inside the hospital were estimated, including physician costs). Data were evaluated by using the Student t test and a multivariable linear regression analysis. RESULTS: At 6 months, 352 patients (239 [68%] men, 113 [32%] women; mean age, 65 years) were analyzed. The use of contrast-enhanced MR angiography versus duplex US reduced the number of additional vascular imaging procedures by 42%; contrast-enhanced MR angiography was also associated with higher therapeutic confidence. Diagnostic costs for contrast-enhanced MR angiography were 167 euros (186 dollars) higher than those for duplex US (P < .001). No statistically significant differences were found for total cost, changes in disease severity, or changes in QOL between patients examined with duplex US and those examined with contrast-enhanced MR angiography (P > .05). CONCLUSION: Replacing duplex US with contrast-enhanced MR angiography for the initial imaging work-up of patients with PAD reduces the need for additional imaging, although diagnostic costs are higher.

Accuracy of semiautomated analysis of 3D contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance angiography for detection and quantification of aortoiliac stenoses.

OBJECTIVES: We sought to compare reproducibility and accuracy of semiautomated stenosis detection and quantification in 3D contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance angiography (CE-MRA) images with conventional evaluation of 3D CE-MRA in patients with peripheral arterial disease (PAD) by using intra-arterial digital subtraction angiography (IA-DSA) as standard of reference. METHODS: Twenty-five patients with PAD underwent CE-MRA and IA-DSA. Three blinded observers independently evaluated CE-MRA datasets for stenoses in the aortoiliac region using semiautomated computer analysis. Semiautomated measurements were compared with conventional measurements of stenosis on CE-MRA datasets, as measured by 3 other independent observers blinded to all other measurements. Interobserver agreement was quantified using kappa (kappa) and intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs). Sensitivity and specificity were determined for both semiautomated and conventional measurements. RESULTS: Semiautomated measurements were successful in 124 of the 125 arterial segments. The sensitivity of semiautomated measurements was 89% for all observers; specificity varied between 87% and 89%. For conventional measurements of CE-MRA, sensitivity varied between 79% and 86%; specificity was between 86% and 96%. There was good interobserver agreement between all readers for semiautomated measurements (combined kappa for all 3 observers together = 0.78; ICC = 0.82), as well as for conventional measurements (combined kappa = 0.70; and ICC = 0.83). Differences between ICCs, combined kappa values, and accuracy of both measurements were not significant (all P > 0.05). CONCLUSION: Semiautomated analysis of aortoiliac 3D CE-MRA has the same high accuracy for detection and quantification of stenoses as conventional readings of CE-MRA.

Imaging peripheral arterial disease: a randomized controlled trial comparing contrast-enhanced MR angiography and multi-detector row CT angiography.

PURPOSE: To prospectively evaluate clinical utility, patient outcomes, and costs of contrast material-enhanced magnetic resonance (MR) angiography compared with multi-detector row computed tomographic (CT) angiography for initial imaging in the diagnostic work-up of patients with peripheral arterial disease. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Institutional review board approval and informed consent were obtained. Patients referred for diagnostic imaging work-up to evaluate the feasibility of a revascularization procedure were randomly assigned to undergo either MR angiography or CT angiography. Clinical utility was assessed with therapeutic confidence (scale of 0-10) at initial imaging and with the need for additional imaging. Patient outcomes included ankle-brachial index, maximum walking distance, change in clinical status, and health-related quality of life. Actual diagnostic and therapeutic costs were calculated from the hospital perspective. Differences between group means were calculated with unpaired t tests and 95% confidence intervals. RESULTS: A total of 157 consecutive patients with peripheral arterial disease were prospectively randomized to undergo MR angiography (51 men, 27 women; mean age, 63 years) or CT angiography (50 men, 29 women; mean age, 64 years). For one of the 78 patients in the MR group, no data were available. Mean confidence for MR angiography (7.7) was slightly lower than that for CT angiography (8.0, P = .8). During 6 months of follow-up, 13 patients in the MR group compared with 10 patients in the CT group underwent additional vascular imaging (P = .5). Although not statistically significant, there was a consistent trend of less improvement in the MR group across all patient outcomes. The average cost for diagnostic imaging was 359 ($438) higher in the MR group than in the CT group (95% confidence interval: 209, 511 [$255, $623]; P < .001). Therapeutic costs were higher in the MR group, but the difference was not significant. CONCLUSION: The results suggest that CT angiography has some advantages over MR angiography in the initial evaluation of peripheral arterial disease.

Comparison of generic and disease-specific questionnaires for the assessment of quality of life in patients with peripheral arterial disease.

OBJECTIVE: This study compared the ability of generic and disease-specific questionnaires to assess quality of life (QOL) at baseline and to detect change in QOL after treatment in patients with peripheral arterial disease (PAD). METHODS: This prospective multicenter trial recruited 514 patients with PAD who needed an imaging workup and had an ankle brachial pressure index of less than 0.90. Patients with severe comorbidity were excluded, leaving a study population of 450 patients. Patients completed two generic questionnaires, the Short Form 36 (SF-36) and the European Quality of Life 5D (EuroQol-5D), and one disease-specific questionnaire, the Vascular Quality of Life (VascuQol) at baseline and after 6 months of follow-up. Rutherford classification and treadmill walking distance were determined at baseline and after 6 months of follow-up and were considered indicators of disease severity. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves and areas under the curves (AUCs) were used to evaluate each of the three questionnaires for its ability to discriminate between severe and mild disease at baseline and to discriminate between a large and small change in disease severity after follow-up. The underlying assumption was that disease severity is a major determinant of QOL. This implies that the validity of a QOL questionnaire is reflected by its ability to discriminate between mildly and severely diseased patients. RESULTS: At baseline, 443 patients and after follow-up, 386 patients completed questionnaires. At baseline, no significant ( P >.05) differences were observed among AUCs for the total scores of the three questionnaires, indicating that all three questionnaires assessed the disease severity equally well. After follow-up, the AUCs for the VascuQol were significantly higher than the AUCs for the SF-36 and EuroQol-5D with respect to detection of improvement in Rutherford classification ( P < .05), indicating that change in disease severity after follow-up was best detected by the VascuQol. CONCLUSION: The VascuQol is the preferred questionnaire as outcome measure for QOL in future trials and clinical follow-up of patients with PAD.

Contrast-enhanced peripheral MR angiography using SENSE in multiple stations: feasibility study.

PURPOSE: To investigate if the use of parallel imaging is feasible and beneficial for peripheral contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance angiography (CE-MRA). MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 19 consecutive patients underwent peripheral CE-MRA using SENSE with two-fold reduction in the upper and lower leg stations. Conventional nonaccelerated imaging using constant level appearance (CLEAR) was used in the aortoiliac station. The findings were compared with those in a similar patient group that underwent peripheral CE-MR angiography using our standard imaging protocol without SENSE. Intraarterial digital subtraction angiography (IA-DSA) was used as the standard of reference. Lower extremity vessels were divided into anatomic segments (aortoiliac, upper legs, lower legs) for review. In each anatomic segment signal- and contrast-to-noise ratios (SNR, CNR), venous contamination, subjective image quality, as well as sensitivity and specificity, were determined for both patient groups. RESULTS: SNR and CNR improved significantly for the aortoiliac and upper leg segments (all P-values < or = 0.001). Small reductions were seen in the frequency of disturbing venous enhancement (P = not significant). There were no significant differences with regards to subjective image quality or diagnostic accuracy (all P > 0.3). Overall sensitivity and specificity in the SENSE group were 81% and 95%, respectively. For the non-SENSE group, these values were 79% and 96%, respectively. CONCLUSION: Preliminary results show that three-station peripheral CE-MRA using a full length peripheral arterial coil in combination with SENSE in the upper and lower leg stations is feasible and useful for further optimization of peripheral MRA. Using SENSE allows for routine, high-quality depiction of the entire peripheral vascular tree including the pedal arch. Higher SENSE factors are needed for further optimization.

Contrast-enhanced peripheral MR angiography at 3.0 Tesla: initial experience with a whole-body scanner in healthy volunteers.

PURPOSE: To report preliminary experience with contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance angiography (CE-MRA) of the peripheral arteries on a 3.0 T whole-body scanner equipped with a prototype body coil. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Four healthy volunteers were imaged on the 3.0 T system and, for comparative purposes, two of the subjects were also imaged on a commercially available 1.5 T whole-body system. To investigate field strength influence on objective image quality, signal-to-noise (SN) and contrast-to-noise (CN) ratios were calculated for named vessels from the infrarenal aorta to the ankles at both field strengths. Comparable imaging protocols were used at both field strengths. In addition, two reviewers, blinded for field strength, gave subjective image quality scores (three-point scale). RESULTS: SN and CN ratios were approximately equal on both systems (variation < or =9%) for the iliac and proximal upper leg stations. For the popliteal and lower leg stations SN ratios were 36% and 97% higher, and CN ratios were 44% and 127% higher, at 3.0 T. Subjective image quality at 3.0 T was substantially better for the distal upper and lower legs. CONCLUSION: Contrast-enhanced peripheral MRA is possible at 3.0 T when an imaging protocol similar to a current state-of-the-art 1.5 T protocol is used. Objective and subjective image quality at 3.0 T is comparable for the iliac and upper legs but better for the popliteal and lower leg arteries.