Magnetic Resonance Imaging of Hypoxia for Radiation Treatment Guidance in Glioblastoma Multiforme (MANGO)

The ability to image tumour hypoxia at diagnosis and prior to radiotherapy is extremely important to appropriately adapt radiotherapy plans such that to selectively deliver higher doses of radiation to those more aggressive tumour subregions, thereby improving the chances to achieve better local tumour control. Preoperative imaging of tumour hypoxia also offers the opportunity for 'supra-marginal resections' in surgical planning beyond current neurosurgical standard of care. Additionally, accurately identifying regions of tumour hypoxia harbouring tumour progression at follow up is fundamental in patient follow-up, allowing multidisciplinary teams to more confidently intervene at an earlier stage of tumour recurrence and personalise therapy tailored to the tumour's response to treatment. Routine imaging of tumour hypoxia is currently challenging, as it requires [18F]-Fluoromisonidazole (18F-FMISO PET) imaging, which is not available in the majority of clinical centres. Today, the availability of accelerated quantitative MRI sequences on clinical MRI systems could enable quantification of tumour hypoxia without putting an unfeasible burden on patients' scan sessions. The next frontier in radiotherapy treatment will use these techniques to identify hypoxic tumour tissues and personalise treatments to the patient's unique tumour biology, maximising the probability of tumour control.

This clinical study will acquire additional images of brain cancer patients. The images will not change the patient's treatment. This study is designed to evaluate the role of oxygen enhanced (OE) MRI and BOLD MRI in detecting regions of hypoxic tumour and to evaluate their use as imaging methods to selectively deliver targeted radiotherapy to regions of aggressive disease.