Diagnostic Accuracy of Diffusion Weighted Sequences of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) in Patients of Acute Brain Infarct

Diagnostic Accuracy of Diffusion Weighted Sequences

Abstract

Stroke is typically the most frequent cause of disability and fifth leading cause of death in the past, early detection of acute brain infarct may be challenging for non-invasive diagnostic imaging, but recent advancement in diagnostic imaging makes it possible.

Objective: To determine the diagnostic accuracy of diffusion weighted sequences of magnetic resonance imaging in patients of acute brain infarct.

Methods: In this cross-sectional study, among 70 patients of acute infarct were selected without age and gender discrimination by convenient sampling, at Department of Radiology Children's Hospital, Lahore and Institute of Child Heath Lahore. 1.5- Tesla MRI Philips Ingenia machine was used.

Results: Out of 38 patients with acute brain infarct, 37 were hyper intense on diffusion weighted imaging (DWI) while one patient was iso-intense on DWI, showing 97.4% sensitivity for acute infarct patients. Similarly for evaluating the specificity of DWI, Out of 32 non-infarcted patients, 2 patients were hyper intense on DWI & 30 patients were iso-intense to brain on DWI. Which showed 93.8 % specificity for acute brain infarct. Out of 38 patients with infarct, 35 were hypo intense and 3 patients were iso-intense on ADC.

Conclusions: Diffusion weighted sequences of MRI were highly accurate in detection of acute brain infarction. Diffusion weighted imaging (DWI) had superior sensitivity over the apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) for the detection of acute brain infarction but has same specificity like ADC.