Use of shear wave elastography to differentiate benign and malignant breast lesions

Abstract

ORIGINAL ARTICLE PURPOSE We aimed to determine the correlations between the elasticity values of solid breast masses and histopathological findings to define cutoff elasticity values differentiating malignant from benign lesions. MATERIALS and METHODSA total of 115 solid breast lesions of 109 consecutive patients were evaluated prospectively using shear wave elastography (SWE). Two orthogonal elastographic images of each lesion were obtained. Minimum, mean, and maximum elasticity values were calculated in regions of interest placed over the stiffest areas on the two images; we also calculated mass/fat elasticity ratios. Correlation of elastographic measurements with histopathological results were studied. RESULTS Eighty-three benign and thirty-two malignant lesions were histopathologically diagnosed. The minimum, mean, and maximum elasticity values, and the mass/fat elasticity ratios of malignant lesions, were significantly higher than those of benign lesions. The cutoff value was 45.7 kPa for mean elasticity (sensitivity, 96%; specificity, 95%), 54.3 kPa for maximum elasticity (sensitivity, 95%; specificity, 94%), 37.1 kPa for minimum elasticity (sensitivity, 96%; specificity, 95%), and 4.6 for the mass/fat elasticity ratio (sensitivity, 97%; specificity, 95%). CONCLUSION SWE yields additional valuable quantitative data to ultrasonographic examination on solid breast lesions. SWE may serve as a complementary tool for diagnosis of breast lesions. Long-term clinical studies are required to accurately select lesions requiring biopsy.

A Set of Shear Wave Elastography Quantitative Parameters Combined with Ultrasound BI-RADS to Assess Benign and Malignant Breast Lesions

“…This result is consistent with that of Berg et al (2012). Though the cutoff value in this study (57.42 kPa) was lower than that of Berg et al, reported by prior studies Ç ebi Olgun et al 2014;Ko et al 2014;Lee et al 2013;Xiao et al 2013). SD alone has less clear-cut value according to multiple studies (Ç ebi Olgun et al 2014;Evans et al 2010;Gweon et al 2013;Lee et al 2013;Xiao et al 2013).…”

“…Though the cutoff value in this study (57.42 kPa) was lower than that of Berg et al, reported by prior studies Ç ebi Olgun et al 2014;Ko et al 2014;Lee et al 2013;Xiao et al 2013). SD alone has less clear-cut value according to multiple studies (Ç ebi Olgun et al 2014;Evans et al 2010;Gweon et al 2013;Lee et al 2013;Xiao et al 2013). Evans et al (2010) and Lee et al (2013) reported that SD was a useful measurement of heterogeneity in differentiating benign from malignant breast lesions.…”

Clinical Application of Shear Wave Elastography in Breast Masses

“…Several reports have demonstrated the diagnostic accuracy of SWE (2,8,12,19,20). However, radiologists usually use this technique in addition to conventional US.…”

“…Berg et al reported optimal diagnostic performance with E max (12) and some studies have reported that SD alone exhibits excellent performance (11). In SWE, the parameters are obtained from a fixed ROI, which is generally the stiffest area, and SD does not reflect the heterogeneity of the entire lesion (19). Therefore, based on the combination of these studies, we focused on E max and E mean .…”

Value of Shear Wave Elastography for differentiating benign and malignant renal lesions

“…SWER has been used in breast [28] and prostate [29] imaging to differentiate malignant tumors from benign ones. Lu et al [23] used SWER values to discriminate between benign and malignant renal tumors in a large series that included 201 renal lesions (44 benign, 157 malignant).…”