Shoulder MRI-based radiomics for diagnosis and severity staging assessment of surgically treated supraspinatus tendon tears

ObjectiveTo develop and validate MRI-based radiomics models capable of evaluating supraspinatus tendon tears within the shoulder joints by using arthroscopy as the reference standard.MethodsA total of 432 patients (332 in the training set and 100 in the external validation set) with intact supraspinatus tendon (n = 202) and supraspinatus tendon tear (n = 230, 130 full-thickness tears and 100 partial-thickness tears) were enrolled. Radiomics features were extracted from fat-saturated T2-weighted coronal images. Two radiomics signature models for detecting supraspinatus tendon abnormalities (tear or not), and stage lesion severity (full- or partial-thickness tear) and radiomics scores (Rad-score), were constructed and calculated using multivariate logistic regression analysis. The diagnostic performance of the two models was validated using ROC curves on the training and validation datasets.ResultsFor the radiomics model of no tears or tears, thirteen features from MR images were used to build the radiomics signature with an AUC value of 0.98 in the training set, 0.97 in the internal validation set, and 0.98 in the external validation set. For the radiomics model of full- or partial-thickness tears, thirteen features from MR images were used to build the radiomics signature with an AUC value of 0.79 in the training set, 0.69 in the internal validation set, and 0.77 in the external validation set.ConclusionThe proposed radiomics models in this study can accurately rule out supraspinatus tendon tears and are capable of assessing the severity staging of tears with moderate accuracy based on shoulder MR images.

Automated summary

This study developed and validated MRI-based radiomics models for evaluating supraspinatus tendon tears in the shoulder joints. A total of 432 patients were enrolled and radiomics features were extracted from MRI images. Two radiomics models were constructed to detect tendon abnormalities and assess tear severity, and their diagnostic performance was evaluated using ROC curves in training and validation datasets.