Can peritumoral regions increase the efficiency of machine-learning prediction of pathological invasiveness in lung adenocarcinoma manifesting as ground-glass nodules?

Background The peri-tumor microenvironment plays an important role in the occurrence, growth and metastasis of cancer. The aim of this study is to explore the value and application of a CT image-based deep learning model of tumors and peri-tumors in predicting the invasiveness of ground-glass nodules (GGNs). Methods Preoperative thin-section chest CT images were reviewed retrospectively in 622 patients with a total of 687 pulmonary GGNs. GGNs are classified according to clinical management strategies as invasive lesions (IAC) and non-invasive lesions (AAH, AIS and MIA). The two volumes of interest (VOIs) identified on CT were the gross tumor volume (GTV) and the gross volume of tumor incorporating peritumoral region (GPTV). Three dimensional (3D) DenseNet was used to model and predict GGN invasiveness, and five-fold cross validation was performed. We used GTV and GPTV as inputs for the comparison model. Prediction performance was evaluated by sensitivity, specificity, and area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC). Results The GTV-based model was able to successfully predict GGN invasiveness, with an AUC of 0.921 (95% CI, 0.896-0.937). Using GPTV, the AUC of the model increased to 0.955 (95% CI, 0.939-0.971). Conclusions The deep learning method performed well in predicting GGN invasiveness. The predictive ability of the GPTV-based model was more effective than that of the GTV-based model.