Mechanistic Study on the Diagnosis of Esophageal Cancer Lymph Node Metastasis Using Spectral CT, Multimodal MRI, FAPI PET-CT, Pathology, and AI Evaluation System

Mechanistic Study on the Diagnosis of Esophageal Cancer Lymph Node Metastasis Using Spectral CT, Multimodal MRI, FAPI PET-CT, Pathology, and AI Evaluation System

The objective of this study is to address the urgent issues in the diagnosis of lymph node metastasis in esophageal cancer. By employing multimodal MRI, spectral CT imaging and FAPI PET-CTtechniques, the study will correlate lymph node images with postoperative pathology results. Additionally, AI technology will be applied to learn from multimodal imaging data, enabling comprehensive analysis and evaluation of lymph node metastasis. Using a large volume of clinical and imaging data, a predictive model will be established to provide individualized lymph node metastasis risk assessments for each esophageal cancer patient. This will, in turn, offer robust support for personalized treatment strategies in esophageal cancer.

Inclusion Criteria:

1. Consecutive patients with pathological diagnosis of esophageal cancer.
2. Patients underwent radical esophagectomy and lymph node dissection, with preoperative multimodal MRI, spectral CT and FAPI PET-CT ; patients underwent neoadjuvant therapy followed by radical surgery, with preoperative multimodal MRI, spectral CT and FAPI PET-CTboth before and after neoadjuvant therapy.
3. No history of malignant tumors or cancer-related treatments.
4. Complete postoperative pathological data, allowing for a one-to-one comparison of preoperative lymph node imaging and postoperative histopathology for evaluation.

Exclusion Criteria:

1. Contraindications for MRI, spectral CT or FAPI PET-CT.
2. Patients who refuse to participate in this study.