Predictive value of MRI in lung cancer.

Pathologic results of 543 lymph nodes removed during 164 radical surgery for lung cancer is compared with the expected findings based on preoperative MRI imaging. Specificity of T2 weighted MRI images were 95.5% for individual lymph nodes and 88.1% for TNM staging, respectively. Sensitivity was found to be 89.4% for lymph nodes and 94.6% for TNM staging of the patient. The accuracy of the MRI imaging was 84.7%. Properly chose MRI imaging and interpretation sounds to be no inferior to more invasive methods as collar mediastinoscopy, Chamberlain procedure or VATS exploration.