Automatic classification of focal liver lesions based on clinical DCE-MR and T2-weighted images: A feasibility study

Focal liver lesion classification is an important part of diagnostics. In clinical practice, T2-weighted (T2W) and dynamic contrast enhanced (DCE) MR images are used to determine the type of lesion. For automatic liver lesion classification only T2W images are exploited. In this feasibility study, a multi-modal approach for automatic lesion classification of five lesion classes (adenoma, cyst, haemangioma, HCC, and metastasis) is studied. Features are derived from four sets: (A) non-corrected, and (B) motion corrected DCE-MRI, (C) T2W images, and (D) B+C combined, originating from 43 patients. An extremely randomized forest is used as classifier. The results show that motion corrected DCE-MRI features are a valuable addition to the T2W features, and improve the accuracy in discriminating benign and malignant lesions, as well as the classification of the five lesion classes. The multimodal approach shows promising results for an automatic liver lesion classification.