Diagnosis and staging of ovarian cancer: Comparative values of Doppler andconventional US, CT, and MR imaging correlated with surgery and histopathologic analysis - Report of the Radiology Diagnostic Oncology Group

PURPOSE: To determine the optimal imaging modality for diagnosis and stagin g of ovarian cancer. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Two hundred eighty women suspected to have ovarian c ancer were enrolled in a prospective study before surgery. Doppler ultrason ography (US), computed tomography (CT), and magnetic resonance (MR) imaging were used to evaluate the mass; conventional US, CT, and MR imaging were u sed to stage spread. RESULTS: All three modalities had high accuracy (0.91) for the overall diag nosis of malignancy. In the ovaries, the accuracy of MR imaging (0.91) was higher than that of CT and significantly higher than that of Doppler US (0. 78). In the extraovarian pelvis and in the abdomen, conventional US, CT, an d MR imaging had similar accuracies (0.87-0.95). In differentiation of dise ase confined to the pelvis from abdominal spread, the specificity of conven tional Us (96%) was higher than that of CT and significantly higher than th at of MR imaging (88%), whereas the sensitivities of MR imaging (98%) and C T (92%) were significantly higher than that of conventional US (75%). CONCLUSION: MR imaging is superior to Doppler US and CT in diagnosis of mal ignant ovarian masses. There is little variation among conventional US, CT, and MR imaging as regards staging.