Role of imaging in the diagnosis of thymic epithelial tumor

Thymic epithelial tumor is the most common primary neoplasm of the anterior mediastinum. Radiological imaging plays an essential role in the diagnosis, staging, and follow-up of thymic epithelial tumor. At the evaluation of anterior mediastinal tumors including thymic epithelial tumor, it is important to understand the role of imaging modality. CT is the imaging modality of first choice for evaluating thymic epithelial tumor and can help distinguish thymoma from other anterior mediastinal abnormalities. MRI also has the ability to evaluate anterior mediastinal tumors, because MRI has high tissue contrast. Therefore, MRI is in particular useful for evaluation of the inner structure and invasion adjacent structures. In addition, diffusion-weighted MRI is a noninvasive technique at the level of molecular movements and can reflect the component of the tissue, and the MRI has the potential to diagnose thymic epithelial tumor. Integrated PET/CT using ¹⁸F-FDG has emerged as a powerful diagnostic tool for the diagnosis, staging, and restaging of neoplasms, and integrated PET/CT is also useful for evaluation of thymic epithelial tumor.