[The use of colour-coded duplex sonography increases diagnostic accuracy of abdominal ultrasound]

Colour Doppler sonography (CDS) avoids misinterpretation of abdominal ultrasonography. Differential diagnosis of pathological structures found by grey-scale sonography can be difficult in many cases.

The present study aimed to determine how often additional colour Doppler sonography could be of benefit to avoid misinterpretation of grey-scale ultrasound images.

1350 abdominal sonograms were examined. The sonographic examination was performed using a Toshiba SSA-140 A-ultrasound machine (3.75 MHz and 2.5 MHz-transducer). Findings which could be misinterpreted in grey-scale images, e. g. structures suspicious of lymph nodes, small areas of ascites, hydronephrosis, cysts or cholestasis, were examined by additional colour Doppler sonography.

327 findings (= 24 % of the cases) were classified as requiring additional examination by colour Doppler sonography. In 73 of these cases (= 22 % of cases having additional CDS), CDS identified blood flow in the pathological structure, which avoided misinterpretation of the grey-scale imaging.

Additional CDS avoids misinterpretation of grey-scale sonography especially in patients with portal hypertension.