Pablo MORIKAWA¹, Hideaki ISHIDA¹, Syoko NAGANUMA¹, Makoto NIIZAWA¹, Osamu NISHIZAWA², Osamu MASAMUNE¹

¹The First Department of Internal Medicine, Akita University School of Medicine, ²Department of Urology, Akita University School of Medicine

キーワード : Renal cell carcinoma, Transcatheter arterial embolization, (Doppler) color flow mapping

A total of nine patients with renal cell carcinoma underwent (Doppler) color flow mapping (CFM) evaluation before and after transcatheter arterial embolization (TAE), and the results were compared with the angiographic and pathologic features. Pre-TAE CFM showed all cases to be vascular or hypervascular tumors, with the formation of anomalous arteriovenous communications (AVC) in three cases. Complete cessation of blood flow was observed in four of nine embolized kidneys. Of the remaining five cases, three showed persistence of vascularity, with a decrease in flow velocity and an elevation in resistive index (RI). In one of the other two cases, AVC was aggravated and consequently resulted in an increased blood flow velocity and lowered RI; and the other case, a large extrarenal collateral became parent and showed reversed arterial flow through the tumor. Interestingly, in one case, CFM clearly demonstrated the arterial blood suppliers of the renal vein tumor thrombus.
This study demonstrates that CFM is not only an excellent modality in establishing the vascular patency of renal cell carcinomas but also in evaluating the effectiveness of TAE.