Improved Diagnosis of Adjacent Organ Invasion of Extrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma by Adding Arterial and Delayed Phases

Abstract

Purpose: To clarify the role of dynamic computed tomography (CT) in diagnosing extrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (eCCA) involving adjacent organs.

Material and methods: We retrospectively analyzed patients diagnosed with eCCA in Iwate Medical University Hospital (Morioka, Japan) during January 2011-December 2021 who underwent dynamic contrast-enhanced CT before biliary intervention, surgery, or chemotherapy. For surgical cases, two radiologists independently reviewed CT images in the portal, dual (adding arterial phase), and triple (adding delayed phase) phases. The mean attenuations of the abdominal aorta, portal vein (PV), hepatic parenchyma, pancreatic parenchyma, and eCCA were measured. The biliary segment-wise longitudinal tumour extent, arterial and PV invasion, organ invasion (liver, pancreas, and duodenum), and regional lymph node metastasis were assessed on a five-point scale. Image performances were compared using the sensitivity, specificity, and area under the curve (AUC).

Results: We included 120 patients (mean age, 71.7 ± 8.9; 84 males). The PV and liver differed most from the bile duct tumour in the portal phase. The abdominal aorta and pancreas differed most from eCCA in the arterial phase. For 80 patients evaluated on the five-point scale, adding phases increased the AUC for pancreatic, duodenal, and arterial invasion for each observer (observer 1, 0.79-0.93, p<0.01, 0.71-0.86, p = 0.04, 0.74-0.99, p = 0.02; observer 2, 0.88-0.96, p = 0.01, 0.73-0.94, p<0.01, 0.80-0.99 p = 0.04; respectively). The AUC for biliary segment-wise longitudinal tumor extent, hepatic, and PV invasion remained unchanged with additional phases.

Conclusions: Portal-phase information is sufficient to evaluate the segmental extent of bile duct and liver/PV invasion. Arterial- and delayed-phase information can help evaluate pancreatic, duodenal, and arterial invasion.

Keywords: adjacent organ invasion; arterial and delayed phases; computed tomography (ct); extrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma; improved diagnosis.