New thesis on MRI in patients with cervical carcinoma
![an illustration of uterus, female reproduction system](/sites/nyheter/files/styles/article_full_width/public/qbank/GettyImages-1291652631-custom20220419105544.jpg)
Susanne Fridsten at the research group Diagnostic Radiology, Department of Molecular Medicine and Surgery, will defend her thesis "Carcinoma of the uterine cervix: aspects on preoperative staging and assessment of treatment effect using magnetic resonance imaging" on April 21, 2022. Main Supervisor is Lennart Blomqvist.
![PhD Student at Diagnostic Radiology](/sites/nyheter/files/styles/article_full_width/public/qbank/Susanne-Fridsten-disp-april-22-custom20220419105116.jpg)
What's the main focus of your thesis?
My thesis focuses on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in patients with cervical carcinoma, both as part of the initial work-up, but also during treatment with chemoradiotherapy (CRT).
Which are the most important results?
One important finding was that contrast-enhancement is unnecessary at baseline MRI in the work-up for patients receiving surgical treatment. We have updated our clinical MRI protocol accordingly. We also found that tumour visibility vs non-visibility on baseline MRI has no impact on the long-term outcome in patients with small tumours. A study on experienced and less experienced reviewers of MRI and ultrasound showed that consistent results on image review could be reached following a short training session, and that reproducibility was higher for MRI than for ultrasound. In a pilot-study including 15 patients, the results indicated that the risk of relapse can be predicted already at 5 weeks after initiation of CRT, using MRI.
How can this new knowledge contribute to the improvement of people's health?
As described above, as a direct consequence of the first study, contrast-enhanced sequences have been excluded from the MRI protocol at Karolinska, in the work-up of patients with cervical carcinoma. This shortens the examination time and makes it less unpleasant for the patients.
Given that our results from the pilot-study can be validated in larger studies, this may contribute to individualized treatment resulting in less morbidity in expected “responders”, and adjusted treatment during therapy for expected “non-responders” and thereby possibly improving survival.
What are your future ambitions?
Now my focus is on the dissertation. Thereafter I will see what the future holds. Initially, I will focus on completing my training to become a specialist also in nuclear medicine.
Dissertation
Thursday April 21, 2022 at 9:00, Rolf Luft Auditorium, L1:00, Karolinska University Hospital, Solna