Intraprocedurally EOB-MRI/US fusion imaging focusing on hepatobiliary phase findings can help to reduce the recurrence of hepatocellular carcinoma after radiofrequency ablation.

Background & Aims: To explore the ability of gadolinium-ethoxybenzyl-diethylenetriamine pentaacetic acid magnetic resonance imaging (EOB-MRI)/ultrasound (US) fusion imaging (FI) to improve the prognosis of radiofrequency ablation (RFA) by ablating the characteristic findings of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in hepatobiliary phase (HBP) imaging.

Methods: We retrospectively recruited 115 solitary HCC lesions with size of (15.9 ± 4.6) mm. They were all treated by RFA and preoperative EOB-MRI. According to the modalities guiding RFA performance, the lesions were grouped into contrast enhanced US (CEUS)/US guidance group and EOB-MRI/US FI guidance group. For the latter group, the ablation scope was set to cover the HBP findings (peritumoral hypointensity and irregular protruding margin). The presence of HBP findings, the modalities guided RFA, the recurrence rate were observed.

Results: After an average follow-up of 377 days, local tumor progression (LTP) and intrahepatic distant recurrence (IDR) were 14.8% and 38.4%, respectively. The lesions having HBP findings exhibited a higher recurrence rate (73.7%) than the lesions without HBP findings (42.9%) ( = 0.002) and a low overall recurrence-free curve using the Kaplan-Meier method ( = 0.038). Using EOB-MRI/US FI as guidance, there was no difference in the recurrence rate between the groups with and without HBP findings ( = 0.799). In lesions with HBP findings, RFA guided by EOB-MRI/US FI (53.8%) produced a lower recurrence rate than CEUS/US (84.0%) ( = 0.045).

Conclusions: The intraprocedurally application of EOB-MRI/US FI to determine ablation scope according to HBP findings is feasible and beneficial for prognosis of RFA.