Intra-vital ultrasonographic monitoring of intra-cerebral tumor growth in a rat glioma model: technical note.

The assessment of therapeutic effects in rodent glioma models by comparison of post mortem tumor sizes has to deal with differing individual growth kinetics and the possibility of spontaneous tumor regression. This technical note describes the intravital ultrasonographical monitoring of cerebral tumor growth in individual animals. In the experiments C6 lacZ glioma cells were injected intracerebrally into female Wistar rats. Extended craniectomy allowed for transcutaneous sonographic examination of the tumor growth. Four animals were followed ultrasonographically, the volumes of the tumors were calculated and plotted graphically, and on day 21 histological evaluation was performed. Our results show that ultrasonography is an easy and reliable imaging modality for frequent assessment of tumor growth kinetics in the intra-cerebral rat glioma model. It allows for the intravital monitoring of treatment with new therapeutic strategies and increases the reliability of the model by visualization of the tumor size before initiation of treatment.