Abstract
Brain white matter T2 hyperintensities (WMH) are a frequent MRI finding in adults, both in asymptomatic and in cancer patients. The aim of our study is to determine the relationship between quantitative measures of the volume of WMH and the volume of brain metastatic lesions at the first MRI diagnosis of brain metastases in a population of advanced cancer patients. Brain MRI examinations of 162 consecutive patients were included and 984 brain metastases at first diagnosis were studied. Axial FLAIR images were used to visualize peri-lesional edema and to segment WMH; multiplanar contrast-enhanced T1-weighted TSE images were used to detect, count, segment and measure metastatic lesions. Segmentation of WMH on FLAIR images was performed after linear image registration to eliminate peri-lesional edema from the WMH masks. The distribution of the volumes of metastatic lesions was significantly different (ANOVA, p = 0.003) among all patients and among lung cancer patients (ANOVA, p = 0.003), with higher volumes of metastatic lesions in a higher proportion of patients when WMH were absent. There were no significant differences among groups at the 10 cc threshold of WMH. We found that volumes of brain metastases at the first MR diagnosis in a sample of advanced cancer patients and in the group of lung cancer patients were significantly lower if WMH were present; we suggest that WMH may represent a clinical MRI bio-marker of brain micro-environment resistance to the occurrence of brain metastases.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Peretti-Viton P, Margain D, Murayama N et al (1991) Brain metastases. J Neuroradiol 18:161–172
Suh JH (2010) Stereotactic radiosurgery for the management of brain metastases. N Engl J Med 362(12):1119–1127
Jernal A, Murray T, Samuels A et al (2003) Cancer statistics. CA Cancer J Clin 53:5–26
Nagao E, Yoshiura T, Hiwatashi A et al (2011) 3D turbo spin-echo sequence with motion-sensitized driven-equilibrium preparation for detection of brain metastases on 3T MR imaging. AJNR Am J Neuroradiol 32:664–670
Qian Y-F, Yu C-L, Zhang C et al (2008) MR T1-weighted inversion recovery imaging in detecting brain metastases: could it replace T1-weighted spin-echo imaging? AJNR Am J Neuroradiol 29:701–704
Luzzi KJ, MacDonald IC, Schmidt EE, Kerkvliet N, Morris VL, Chambers AF, Groom AC (1998) Multistep nature of metastatic inefficiency: dormancy of solitary cells after successful extravasation and limited survival of early micrometastases. Am J Pathol 153(3):865–873
Wirtz D, Konstantopoulos K, Searson PC (2011) The physics of cancer: the role of physical interactions and mechanical forces in metastasis. Nat Rev Cancer 11(7):512–522
Weiss L (2000) Metastasis of cancer: a conceptual history from antiquity to the 1990s. Cancer Metastasis Rev 19(3–4):193–383
Fidler IJ, Yano S, Zhang RD et al (2002) The seed and soil hypothesis: vascularization and brain metastases. Lancet Oncol 3(1):53–57
Paget S (1989) The distribution of secondary growths in cancer of the breast. 1889. Cancer Metastasis Rev 8:98–101
Sleeman JP (2012) The metastatic niche and stromal progression. Cancer Metastasis Rev 31(3–4):429–440
Psaila B, Kaplan RN, Port ER, Lyden D (2006–2007) Priming the ‘soil’ for breast cancer metastasis: the pre-metastatic niche. Breast Dis 26:65–74
Sleeman JP, Nazarenko I, Thiele W (2011) Do all roads lead to Rome? Routes to metastasis development. Int J Cancer 128(11):2511–2526
Carlini MJ, De Lorenzo MS, Puricelli L (2011) Cross-talk between tumor cells and the microenvironment at the metastatic niche. Curr Pharm Biotechnol 12(11):1900–1908
Luissint AC, Artus C, Glacial F, Ganeshamoorthy K, Couraud PO (2012) Tight junctions at the blood brain barrier: physiological architecture and disease-associated dysregulation. Fluids Barriers CNS 9(1):23
Al Ahmad A, Gassmann M, Ogunshola OO (2009) Maintaining blood-brain barrier integrity: pericytes perform better than astrocytes during prolonged oxygen deprivation. J Cell Physiol 218(3):612–622
Persidsky Y, Ramirez SH, Haorah J, Kanmogne GD (2006) Blood-brain barrier: structural components and function under physiologic and pathologic conditions. J Neuroimmune Pharmacol 1(3):223–236
Carbonell WS, Ansorge O, Sibson N, Muschel R (2009) The vascular basement membrane as “soil” in brain metastasis. PLoS ONE 4(6):e5857
Vernooij MW, Ikram MA, Tanghe HL, Vincent AJ, Hofman A, Krestin GP, Niessen WJ, Breteler MM, van der Lugt A (2007) Incidental findings on brain MRI in the general population. N Engl J Med 357(18):1821–1828
Mazzone PJ, Marchi N, Fazio V, Taylor JM, Masaryk T, Bury L, Mekhail T, Janigro D (2009) Small vessel ischemic disease of the brain and brain metastases in lung cancer patients. PLoS ONE 4(9):e7242
Brown WR, Thore CR (2011) Review: cerebral microvascular pathology in ageing and neurodegeneration. Neuropathol Appl Neurobiol 37(1):56–74
Brown WR, Moody DM, Thore CR, Anstrom JA, Challa VR (2009) Microvascular changes in the white mater in dementia. J Neurol Sci 283(1–2):28–31
Gouw AA, van der Flier WM, Pantoni L, Inzitari D, Erkinjuntti T, Wahlund LO, Waldemar G, Schmidt R, Fazekas F, Scheltens P, Barkhof F, LADIS study group (2008) On the etiology of incident brain lacunes: longitudinal observations from the LADIS study. Stroke 39(11):3083–3085
Spolveri S, Baruffi MC, Cappelletti C, Semerano F, Rossi S, Pracucci G, Inzitari D (1998) Vascular risk factors linked to multiple lacunar infarcts. Cerebrovasc Dis 8(3):152–157
Pantoni L, Garcia JH (1997) Pathogenesis of leukoaraiosis: a review. Stroke 8(3):652–659
O’Brien JT, Erkinjuntti T, Reisberg B, Roman G, Sawada T, Pantoni L, Bowler JV, Ballard C, DeCarli C, Gorelick PB, Rockwood K, Burns A, Gauthier S, DeKosky ST (2003) Vascular cognitive impairment. Lancet Neurol 2(2):89–98
Mazziotta JC, Toga AW, Evans A et al (1995) A probabilistic atlas of the human brain: theory and rationale for its development. The International Consortium for Brain Mapping (ICBM). Neuroimage 2(2):89–101
Hanbali A, Al-Khasawneh K, Cole-Johnson C, Divine G, Ali H (2007) Protective effect of diabetes against metastasis in patients with non-small cell lung cancer. Arch Intern Med 167(5):513
Murray ME, Vemuri P, Preboske GM, Murphy MC, Schweitzer KJ, Parisi JE, Jack CR Jr, Dickson DW (2012) A quantitative postmortem MRI design sensitive to white matter hyperintensity differences and their relationship with underlying pathology. J Neuropathol Exp Neurol. [Epub ahead of print]
Fazekas F, Schmidt R, Kleinert R, Kapeller P, Roob G, Flooh E (1998) The spectrum of age-associated brain abnormalities: their measurement and histopathological correlates. J Neural Transm Suppl 53:31–39
Gouw AA, Seewann A, van der Flier WM, Barkhof F, Rozemuller AM, Scheltens P, Geurts JJ (2011) Heterogeneity of small vessel disease: a systematic review of MRI and histopathology correlations. J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry 82(2):126–135
Moody DM, Thore CR, Anstrom JA, Challa VR, Langefeld CD, Brown WR (2004) Quantification of afferent vessels shows reduced brain vascular density in subjects with leukoaraiosis. Radiology 233(3):883–890
Marstrand JR, Garde E, Rostrup E, Ring P, Rosenbaum S, Mortensen EL, Larsson HB (2002) Cerebral perfusion and cerebrovascular reactivity are reduced in white matter hyperintensities. Stroke 33(4):972–976
Fukumura D, Duda DG, Munn LL, Jain RK (2010) Tumor microvasculature and microenvironment: novel insights through intravital imaging in pre-clinical models. Microcirculation 17(3):206–225
Davalos D, Grutzendler J, Yang G, Kim JV, Zuo Y, Jung S, Littman DR, Dustin ML, Gan WB (2005) ATP mediates rapid microglial response to local brain injury in vivo. Nat Neurosci 8:752–758
Nimmerjahn A, Kirchhoff F, Helmchen F (2005) Resting microglial cells are highly dynamic surveillants of brain parenchyma in vivo. Science 308:1314–1318
Lorger M, Felding-Habermann B (2010) Capturing changes in the brain microenvironment during initial steps of breast cancer brain metastasis. Am J Pathol 176(6):2958–2971
Ropele S, Seewann A, Gouw AA, van der Flier WM, Schmidt R, Pantoni L, Inzitari D, Erkinjuntti T, Scheltens P, Wahlund LO, Waldemar G, Chabriat H, Ferro J, Hennerici M, O’Brien J, Wallin A, Langhorne P, Visser MC, Barkhof F, Fazekas F, LADIS study group (2009) Quantitation of brain tissue changes associated with white matter hyperintensities by diffusion-weighted and magnetization transfer imaging: the LADIS (Leukoaraiosis and Disability in the Elderly) study. J Magn Reson Imaging 29(2):268–274
Maillard P, Carmichael O, Harvey D, Fletcher E, Reed B, Mungas D, Decarli C (2012) FLAIR and diffusion MRI signals are independent predictors of white matter hyperintensities. AJNR Am J Neuroradiol. [Epub ahead of print]
Maillard P, Fletcher E, Harvey D, Carmichael O, Reed B, Mungas D, DeCarli C (2011) White matter hyperintensity penumbra. Stroke 42(7):1917–1922
Bender ET, Tomé WA (2011) Distribution of brain metastases: implications for non-uniform dose prescriptions. Br J Radiol 84(1003):649–658
Quattrocchi CC, Errante Y, Gaudino C, Mallio CA, Giona A, Santini D, Tonini G, Zobel BB (2012) Spatial brain distribution of intra-axial metastatic lesions in breast and lung cancer patients. J Neurooncol 110(1):79–87
Graf AH, Buchberger W, Langmayr H et al (1988) Site preference of metastatic tumors of the brain. Virchows Arch A Pathol Anat Histopathol 412(5):493–498
Tsukada Y, Fouad A, Pickren JW et al (1983) Central nervous system metastasis from breast carcinoma. Autopsy study. Cancer 52:2349–2354
Trepel M, Arap W, Pasqualini R (2002) In vivo phage display and vascular heterogeneity: implications for targeted medicine. Curr Opin Chem Biol 6:399–404
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Quattrocchi, C.C., Errante, Y., Mallio, C.A. et al. Brain metastatic volume and white matter lesions in advanced cancer patients. J Neurooncol 113, 451–458 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11060-013-1137-z
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11060-013-1137-z