Reproducibility and usefulness of quantitative apparent diffusion coefficient measurements for predicting program death-ligand 1 expression in nasopharyngeal carcinoma

Abstract

Abstract Background Accurate assessment of programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) expression status in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) before immunotherapy is crucial. We aimed to explore the reproducibility and usefulness of the quantitative apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) measurements for predicting PD-L1expression status in NPC. Methods We retrospectively recruited 134 NPC patients who underwent MRI scans and PD-L1 detection. A PD-L1 combined positive score (CPS) ≥ 20 was identified as high expression status. Patients were divide into two cohorts based on the MRI scanning devices, including a 1.5-T MRI cohort (n = 85, 44 PD-L1 high expression) and a 3.0-T MRI cohort (n = 49, 24 PD-L1 high expression). The mean ADC (ADCmean), minimum ADC (ADCmin) and maximal ADC (ADCmax) values were independently measured by two observers. The ADC measurement reproducibility was assessed by interclass correlation coefficients (ICC). The correlations between ADC parameters and CPS were analyzed by spearman’s correlation coefficient (r), and the performance for PD-L1expression status prediction was assessed by the area under receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC). Results The measurement reproducibility of ADCmean, ADCmin and ADCmax was good in the 1.5-T MRI cohort (ICC: 0.843–0.930) and 3.0-T MRI cohort (ICC: 0.929–0.960). The ADCmean, ADCmin, and ADCmax tended to inversely correlate with the CPS (r:-0.37 - -0.52 in the 1.5-T MRI cohort, and − 0.52 - -0.60 in the 3.0-T MRI cohort; P all < 0.01). The ADCmean, ADCmin and ADCmax yielded the AUC of 0.756 (95% CI: 0.651, 0.861), 0.689 (95% CI: 0.576, 0.802), and 0.733 (95%CI: 0.626, 0.839) in the 1.5-T MRI cohort and 0.820 (95%CI: 0.703, 0.937), 0.755 (95% CI: 0.616, 0.894), and 0.760 (95%CI: 0.627, 0.893) in the 3.0-T MRI cohort for predicting PD-L1 high expression status, respectively. Conclusion ADC measurements may act as a reproducible and feasible method to predict PD-L1 expression status in NPC.