Letters To The Editor
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Dec 21, 2015; 21(47): 13400-13402
Published online Dec 21, 2015. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v21.i47.13400
Current status of superparamagnetic iron oxide contrast agents for liver magnetic resonance imaging
Yi-Xiang J Wang
Yi-Xiang J Wang, Department of Imaging and Interventional Radiology, Faculty of Medicine, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
Author contributions: Wang YXJ designed research, analyzed data, and wrote the paper.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The author declares no conflict-of-interest.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Yi-Xiang J Wang, PhD, MMed, Department of Imaging and Interventional Radiology, Faculty of Medicine, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, N.T., Hong Kong, China. yixiang_wang@cuhk.edu.hk
Telephone: +852-26322289
Received: May 28, 2015
Peer-review started: May 31, 2015
First decision: August 26, 2015
Revised: September 15, 2015
Accepted: November 9, 2015
Article in press: November 9, 2015
Published online: December 21, 2015
Abstract

Five types of superparamagnetic iron oxide (SPIO), i.e. Ferumoxides (Feridex® IV, Berlex Laboratories), Ferucarbotran (Resovist®, Bayer Healthcare), Ferumoxtran-10 (AMI-227 or Code-7227, Combidex®, AMAG Pharma; Sinerem®, Guerbet), NC100150 (Clariscan®, Nycomed,) and (VSOP C184, Ferropharm) have been designed and clinically tested as magnetic resonance contrast agents. However, until now Resovist® is current available in only a few countries. The other four agents have been stopped for further development or withdrawn from the market. Another SPIO agent Ferumoxytol (Feraheme®) is approved for the treatment of iron deficiency in adult chronic kidney disease patients. Ferumoxytol is comprised of iron oxide particles surrounded by a carbohydrate coat, and it is being explored as a potential imaging approach for evaluating lymph nodes and certain liver tumors.

Keywords: Superparamagnetic iron oxide, Liver, Hepatocellular carcinoma, Magnetic resonance imaging, Resovist, Gd-EOB-DTPA, Primovist, Eovist

Core tip: Superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticle for liver imaging was conceptualized when the speed of both single-slice computed tomography (CT) scan and multiple-slice magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was slow. It was difficult to accurately observe the “wash-in” and “wash-out” of liver lesion blood flow dynamics. However, recently spiral CT and later multi-slice CT revolutionized liver imaging. MRI scan is also currently much faster due to the improved gradient technology and fast data acquisition sequences. These techniques increased the sensitivity and specificity of dynamic imaging using small molecular agents such as iodinated CT contrast agents and Gadolinium based MRI contrast agents. Gd-EOB-DTPA-enhanced liver MRI is currently emerging as the leading method for diagnosis and staging of hepatocellular carcinoma.