Elastosonography (ES), performed in addition to conventional ultrasonography (US), can improve the differentiation of benign from malignant lesions, providing information on the elasticity of soft tissues. In fact it is well known that malignant lesions are much stiffer than the surrounding healthy tissue. Actually ES is recognized as a promising imaging technique for breast cancer diagnosis, with sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of 85.5, 88.6 and 87 %, respectively [1]. Nevertheless this technique still has some limitations due to the combined effect of the complex variable nature of lesions and subjective factors. To address this issue some Finite Element (FE) models of physical and virtual breast phantoms have been proposed in the literature. Most of such models are characterized by simplified geometries (e.g. cylindrical breast) simulated under plane strain [2, 3] and axial symmetric assumptions [4–6], and model soft tissues as linear elastic [2–6]. This study proposes an advancement in numerical simulation of breast ES. An anthropomorphic FE model of a commercial breast phantom has been developed and validated experimentally by comparing virtual and real ES images. In particular the model has been exploited to investigate the effect of 3D geometry and lesion/healthy tissue interface on virtual ES.

Comparison of finite element and US elastograms of a breast phantom

MATTEI, LORENZA;DI PUCCIO, FRANCESCA;FORTE, PAOLA;
2012-01-01

Abstract

Elastosonography (ES), performed in addition to conventional ultrasonography (US), can improve the differentiation of benign from malignant lesions, providing information on the elasticity of soft tissues. In fact it is well known that malignant lesions are much stiffer than the surrounding healthy tissue. Actually ES is recognized as a promising imaging technique for breast cancer diagnosis, with sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of 85.5, 88.6 and 87 %, respectively [1]. Nevertheless this technique still has some limitations due to the combined effect of the complex variable nature of lesions and subjective factors. To address this issue some Finite Element (FE) models of physical and virtual breast phantoms have been proposed in the literature. Most of such models are characterized by simplified geometries (e.g. cylindrical breast) simulated under plane strain [2, 3] and axial symmetric assumptions [4–6], and model soft tissues as linear elastic [2–6]. This study proposes an advancement in numerical simulation of breast ES. An anthropomorphic FE model of a commercial breast phantom has been developed and validated experimentally by comparing virtual and real ES images. In particular the model has been exploited to investigate the effect of 3D geometry and lesion/healthy tissue interface on virtual ES.
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11568/199713
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