Comparison of Radiographic Approaches to Assess Treatment Response in Pituitary Adenomas: Is RECIST or RANO Good Enough?

CONTEXT: Pituitary adenomas (PA) are often irregularly shaped, particularly posttreatment. There are no standardized radiographic criteria for assessing treatment response, substantially complicating interpretation of prospective outcome data. Existing imaging frameworks for intracranial tumors assume perfectly spherical targets and may be suboptimal.

OBJECTIVE: To compare a three-dimensional (3D) volumetric approach against accepted surrogate measurements to assess PA posttreatment response (PTR).

DESIGN: Retrospective review of patients with available pre- and postradiotherapy (RT) imaging. A neuroradiologist determined tumor sizes in one dimensional (1D) per Response Evaluation in Solid Tumors (RECIST) criteria, two dimensional (2D) per Response Assessment in Neuro-Oncology (RANO) criteria, and 3D estimates assuming a perfect sphere or perfect ellipsoid. Each tumor was manually segmented for 3D volumetric measurements. The Hakon Wadell method was used to calculate sphericity.

SETTING: Tertiary cancer center.

PATIENTS OR OTHER PARTICIPANTS: Patients (n = 34, median age = 50 years; 50% male) with PA and MRI scans before and after sellar RT.

INTERVENTIONS: Patients received sellar RT for intact or surgically resected lesions.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Radiographic PTR, defined as percent tumor size change.

RESULTS: Using 3D volumetrics, mean sphericity = 0.63 pre-RT and 0.60 post-RT. With all approaches, most patients had stable disease on post-RT scan. PTR for 1D, 2D, and 3D spherical measurements were moderately well correlated with 3D volumetrics ( e.g., for 1D: 0.66, P < 0.0001) and were superior to 3D ellipsoid. Intraclass correlation coefficient demonstrated moderate to good reliability for 1D, 2D, and 3D sphere ( P < 0.001); 3D ellipsoid was inferior ( P = 0.009). 3D volumetrics identified more potential partially responding and progressive lesions.

CONCLUSIONS: Although PAs are irregularly shaped, 1D and 2D approaches are adequately correlated with volumetric assessment.