Staging of esophageal cancer using PET/MRI: a systematic review with head-to-head comparison.

Mohebbi, Alisa; Mohammadzadeh, Saeed; Moradi, Zahra; Mohammadi, Afshin; Poustchi, Hossein; Tavangar, Seyed Mohammad

Purpose: To evaluate the staging performance of positron emission tomography/magnetic resonance imaging (PET/MRI) for confirmed esophageal cancer based on the TNM classification system as well as compare it to other alternative modalities (e.g., endoscopic ultrasonography (EUS), computed tomography (CT), MRI, and PET/CT) in a full head-to-head manner. Methods: Protocol was pre-registered a priori at (http://osf.io/6qj5m/). We searched PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, and Cochrane Library for studies until September 10, 2024. The risk of bias was assessed using Modified Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies (QUADAS-2) and Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies–Comparative (QUADAS-C). The classification performance of PET/MRI in T, N, and M staging of esophageal cancer and resectability status were evaluated and compared to other relative modalities. Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations (GRADE) was used for certainty evaluation. Results: Nine studies were included with 245 esophageal cancer patients. For T, N, and M staging, PET/MRI showed 9.1%, 2.0%, and 10.7% upstaging than the histopathological evaluation while these numbers were 19.4%, 12.4%, and 5.3% for downstaging. For direct comparison with PET/CT, PET/MRI showed 0.7% and 5.6% less downstaging and upstaging for N staging and 2.5% and 4.0% for M staging. As for predicting resectability status, pre-ADCmean and post-ADCmean were promising, unlike other parameters (i.e., ΔADCmean, pre-SUVmax, post-SUVmax, and ΔSUVmax). Conclusion: With protocol adjustments, PET/MRI might be utilized in the future for preoperative staging of esophageal cancer. Clinical trial number: N/A.

MAGNETIC resonance imaging; POSITRON emission tomography; ENDOSCOPIC ultrasonography; ESOPHAGEAL cancer; MEDICAL sciences

BMC Medical Imaging, 2025, Vol 25, Issue 1, p1

1471-2342

Academic Journal

10.1186/s12880-025-01565-9