Objective    To evaluate the combination of LAVA and DWI in diagnosis of pancreatic carcinoma.     Methods    MRI of 24 patients pathologically confirmed to have pancreatic carcinoma were retrospectively analyzed. MRI sequences included FS T

1

WI

FS T

2

WI

enhanced multi-phasic LAVA scanning and DWI. Images quality of all sequences was assessed. SIR of tumor/pericancerous tissue in LAVA

DWI

T

1

WI and T

2

WI was compared. ADC values of the cancer

pericancerous tissue were statistically analyzed. The detection r

ate and accuracy of single sequence and those of the combination of LAVA and DWI were compared. The LAVA evaluation of peripancreatic vascular involvement was compared with surgical findings.     Results    Images quality of LAVA was higher than the others (P0.05). The pancreatic cancer/pericancerous tissue SIR in pancreatic parenchyma-phase of LAVA and DWI was higher than the other sequences (P0.05). The ADC value of pancreatic cancer was significantly different from that of the pericancerous tissue (P0.05). The detection rate and accuracy of the combination of LAVA and DWI was higher than those of single sequence. LAVA had a good correlation with surgical findings for peripancreatic vessels that were diagnosed as being invasive or noninvasive by tumors except 3 misdiagnosed cases (the accuracy was 87.5%).     Conclusion    The combination of LAVA and DWI is better than regular sequences and single LAVA sequence in displaying the lesion location

characterization and vessels.