Purpose

To evaluate 3T mpMRI characteristics of transition zone and peripheral zone index prostate cancer lesions stratified by Gleason Score and PI-RADSv2 with whole mount histopathology correlation.

Methods

An institution review board-approved, HIPAA-compliant single-arm observational study of 425 consecutive men with 3T mpMRI prior to radical prostatectomy from December 2009 to October 2016 was performed. A genitourinary radiologist and a genitourinary pathologist matched all lesions detected on whole mount histopathology with lesions concordant for size and location on 3T mpMRI. Differences in clinical, MRI parameters, and histopathology between transition zone and peripheral zone were determined and analyzed with χ² and Mann-Whitney U test. AUC was measured.

Results

3T mpMRI detected 248/323 (76.7%) index lesions in peripheral zone and 75/323 (23.2%) in transition zone. Transition zone prostate cancer had higher median prostate-specific antigen (p = 0.001), larger tumor on 3T mpMRI (p = 0.001), lower proportions of PI-RADSv2 category 4 and 5 (p < 0.001), and lower pathological stage (p = 0.055) compared to peripheral zone prostate cancer. No significant differences were detected in prostate-specific antigen density, preoperative biopsy, and pathology Gleason Scores. After adjusting for significant variables from univariate analysis including prostate volume, tumor volume, prostate-specific antigen, PI-RADSv2 category, AUC for predicting clinically significant tumor in transition zone and peripheral zone were 0.80 and 0.72, respectively (p = 0.36).

Conclusions

The diagnostic performance of PI-RADSv2 for clinically significant transition and peripheral zone prostate cancer was similar. However, there was a lower portion of PI-RADSv2 4 and 5 lesions in transition zone compared to peripheral zone.