Comparison of the safety of standard and triple dose gadodiamide injection in MR imaging of the central nervous system. A double-blind study.

Gadodiamide injection was administered intravenously to 49 patients with known or suspected CNS lesions undergoing MR imaging. Two parallel groups were used to evaluate the efficacy and safety of single doses of 0.1 (25 patients) and 0.3 (24 patients) mmol/kg b.w. The principal measures of efficacy were diagnostic yield of MR and the overall contrast enhancement. Adverse events and serum bilirubin were the main safety parameters. Contrast enhancement of the lesion was observed for 16 patients in each dose group. Thirteen patients in the 0.1 and 17 in the 0.3 mmol/kg group had their diagnosis amended following the postcontrast image, but only one patient in each dose group had their management affected by new information from the postcontrast image. The overall diagnostic utility of gadodiamide injection was good, but there were no differences between the 2 doses studied in this respect. No injection-associated discomfort or other adverse events were reported. No clinically important changes in serum bilirubin, or other parameters of blood chemistry, or hematology were observed. Overall, the safety profile of gadodiamide injection 0.3 mmol/kg b.w. in this study was similar to that of 0.1 mmol/kg b.w.