Keywords:
Tissue characterisation, Diagnostic procedure, Ultrasound, Breast, Soft tissues / Skin, Ultrasound physics
Authors:
S. Sanabria, K. Martini, M. Rominger, K. Dedes, D. Vorburger, T. Frauenfelder, O. Goksel; Zurich/CH
DOI:
10.1594/ecr2018/C-1388
Aims and objectives
Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women.
Several different imaging techniques are available to assess tumorous breast lesions [1-4].
To date,
the mammography has been the reference standard to assess breast lesions [1].
However,
such ionizing radiation is prescribed for biannual screening of women only at high risk,
over 50 years old.
Ultrasound (US) is an attractive tool for breast assessment because it is widely available,
non-ionizing and inexpensive.
However,
conventional ultrasound images, which show the reflectivity and texture of tissue,
fail to differentiate benign and malignant solid tumors,
and thus cannot prevent unnecessary biopsies [5].
Quantification of tissue biomechanical properties using ultrasound has a high potential for diagnosis and staging of breast disease.
Speed-of-sound (SoS)-US measurements have been successfully performed in the past decade in several centers worldwide with a dedicated 3D-US-tomography machine [6-8].
The goal of this work is to assess the potential of a novel hand-held speed of sound (SoS) method for differentiation of benign and malignant breast tumors using a standard ultrasound machine.
Compared to 3D-US-tomography,
our novel 2D-technique has the following advantages: the technique can be performed with standard US hardware in any position; the method does not require a large,
degassed,
hygienic water bath or dedicated table; the corresponding equipment cost and necessary clinical space are small; and the measurement times are reduced [9-10].