[Quantitative imaging in uro-oncology]

Introduction: Imaging currently performed in uro-oncology could provide useful information. The use of all this information could help to better understand tumor growth and response to treatment. Therefore, it seems interesting to review the knowledge, to describe the main techniques currently available in many centers or in process and to clarify their results.

Materials and methods: A systematic literature review was conducted in the PubMed database to identify all imaging techniques performed for therapeutic evaluation in uro-oncology. The keywords used were: cancer, kidney, bladder, prostate, urology biomarkers, imaging, ultrasound, CT-scan, MRI, PET-CT, RECIST, BOLD, ASL, gold DWI Diffusion, contrast, F-miso. The first publications identified were analyzed to search unidentified studies by the selected keywords.

Results: From simple to more complex morphology data from functional imaging (PET, MRI), data obtained from imaging helps to better understand tumor growth and response to treatment. Although optimizations are coming, all the techniques reported are available in many centers or going to be.

Conclusion: The imaging evaluation in onco-urology can bring a large amount of information. Integrating to research protocols is now essential to sustain this activity.