3-D Transducer Mounted Shear Wave Absolute Vibro-Elastography: Proof of Concept

Area of Science:

• Medical Imaging
• Biophysics
• Oncology

Background:

• Quantitative ultrasound elastography aids prostate cancer detection.
• Shear wave absolute vibro-elastography (SWAVE) offers quantitative, volumetric tissue stiffness assessment.
• External multifrequency excitation is key to SWAVE technology.

Purpose of the Study:

• To present a novel 3-D hand-operated endorectal SWAVE system for prostate biopsy.
• To validate the system's performance using quality assurance phantoms and in vivo human liver data.
• To compare the system's accuracy against 3-D magnetic resonance elastography (MRE) and an existing 3-D SWAVE system (M-SWAVE).

Main Methods:

• Development of a 3-D hand-operated endorectal SWAVE system integrated with a clinical ultrasound machine.
• Utilizing subsector acquisition of radio frequency (RF) data for high frame rate shear wave imaging (up to 250 Hz).
• Characterization with eight quality assurance phantoms and in vivo validation via intercostal liver scans in seven healthy volunteers.

Main Results:

• The system demonstrated high correlations with 3-D MRE (99% in phantoms, 94% in liver data).
• Excellent agreement was observed with the M-SWAVE system (99% in phantoms, 98% in liver data).
• The system achieved high effective frame rates for shear wave imaging.

Conclusions:

• The developed 3-D hand-operated endorectal SWAVE system is a viable proof of concept for quantitative tissue stiffness assessment.
• The system shows high accuracy and potential for integration into prostate biopsy procedures.
• Further validation in vivo for prostate imaging is warranted.