Ultrasound-based radiomics score: a potential biomarker for the prediction of progression-free survival in ovarian epithelial cancer

Purpose More than 80% of patients with ovarian epithelial cancer (OEC) show complete remission after initial treatment but eventually experience recurrence of the disease. This study aimed to develop a radiomics signature to identify a new prognostic indicator based on preoperative ultrasound imaging. Methods A total of 111 patients with OEC who underwent transvaginal ultrasound before surgery were included. Of these, 76 were divided into the training cohort and 35 into the test cohort. We defined the region of interest (ROI) of the tumor by manually drawing the tumor contour on the ultrasound image of the lesion. The radiomics features were extracted from ultrasound images. The radiomics score (Rad-Score) was constructed using the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO) analysis and Cox regression. Combined with the ultrasound radiomics features, significant clinical variables were also used to establish predictive models for 5-year progression-free survival (PFS) prediction. The efficiency of the model was evaluated using the area under the curve (AUC). Kaplan–Meier analysis was used to evaluate the association between the Rad-Score and PFS. Results The combined model was superior to the clinical and Rad-Score models in estimating 5-year PFS and achieved an AUC of 0.868 (95%CI 0.766–0.971) in the training cohort. The Rad-Score was negatively correlated with prognosis in the training and test cohorts. Conclusions The combined model that incorporated both clinical parameters and ultrasound radiomics features achieved a good prognosis in patients with OEC, which might aid clinical decision-making.