Pathologic stratification of operable lung adenocarcinoma using radiomics features extracted from dual energy CT images

PURPOSE To evaluate the usefulness of surrogate biomarkers as predictors of histopathologic tumor grade and aggressiveness using radiomics data from dual-energy computed tomography (DECT), with the ultimate goal of accomplishing stratification of early-stage lung adenocarcinoma for optimal treatment. RESULTS Pathologic grade was divided into grades 1, 2, and 3. Multinomial logistic regression analysis revealed i-uniformity and 97.5th percentile CT attenuation value as independent significant factors to stratify grade 2 or 3 from grade 1. The AUC value calculated from leave-one-out cross-validation procedure for discriminating grades 1, 2, and 3 was 0.9307 (95% CI: 0.8514-1), 0.8610 (95% CI: 0.7547-0.9672), and 0.8394 (95% CI: 0.7045-0.9743), respectively. MATERIALS AND METHODS A total of 80 patients with 91 clinically and radiologically suspected stage I or II lung adenocarcinoma were prospectively enrolled. All patients underwent DECT and F-18-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) positron emission tomography (PET)/CT, followed by surgery. Quantitative CT and PET imaging characteristics were evaluated using a radiomics approach. Significant features for a tumor aggressiveness prediction model were extracted and used to calculate diagnostic performance for predicting all pathologic grades. CONCLUSIONS Quantitative radiomics values from DECT imaging metrics can help predict pathologic aggressiveness of lung adenocarcinoma.