Assessment of Early Therapy Response of Non-Hodgkin's and Hodgkin's Lymphoma Using B-Mode Ultrasound and Dynamic Contrast-Enhanced Ultrasound.

OBJECTIVES: Here we asked, whether contrast enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) enables to judge early treatment response in malignant lymphoma as a potential guidance for further treatment.

METHODS: From May 2017 to May 2018, 21 patients with histologically confirmed diagnosis of lymphoma were examined by B-mode ultrasound (B-US) and CEUS at fixed early time points after commencing therapy (days [d] 0, 15 and 30 after therapy start) and contrast enhancement patterns in target lymphoma lesions were quantified using Bracco-VUE Box® (DCE-US). To estimate the potential value of CEUS-enhancement patterns for early response prediction, patients were grouped according to their best achieved actual response into complete remission (CR) patients, partial remission (PR) patients or progressive disease (PD) patients.

RESULTS: Between d0, d15 and d30, CR-patients showed a median lymphoma shrinking by 34% in B-US. PD-patients experienced a median lymphoma size reduction by 44% on day 15, but lymphoma mass again increased by 20% between d15 and d30. In contrast, the median CEUS enhancement intensity, as assessed by the area under the curve (AUC) was increasing at d15 in CR and PD patients (CR to 152%, PD: to 126%), but decreased at d30 to 14% in CR patients and 22% in PD patients.

CONCLUSIONS: While early response assessment using B-US might be useful to predict treatment response in lymphoma, CEUS and DCE-US-although often feasible-do not provide additional value in this regard.