Dr. Meng on MRI-US Fusion Targeted Biopsy for High-Grade Prostate Cancer

Xiaosong Meng, MD, PhD, NYU Langone Medical Center, discusses MRI-US fusion targeted biopsies and how they can be used to identify high-grade prostate cancers.

Following results of an increase prostate-specific antigen (PSA) score, patients undergo a systematic biopsy, known as a traditional method of diagnosing prostate cancer, Meng explains. This method is a random sampling; therefore, imaging is being used to improve the detection of localization of prostate cancer. For example, a multi-parametric MRI is a combination of anatomic and functional sequences that allow for increased localization.

From this imaging technique, each abnormality is given a suspicion score from 1 to 5, with 5 being the most likely to be cancerous, Meng explains. Practitioners then perform a MRI-US fusion targeted biopsy, which allows them to better target lesions. A recent study showed that patients with an increasing MRI suspicion score does correlate with identifying high-grade prostate cancer.