Evaluating the Usefulness of Breast Strain Elastography for Intraductal Lesions

Purpose: Strain elastography for imaging lesion stiffness is being used as a diagnostic aid in the malignant/benign discrimination of breast diseases. While acquiring elastography in addition to B-mode images has been reported to help avoid performing unnecessary biopsies, intraductal lesions are difficult to discriminate whether they are malignant or benign using elastography. An objective evaluation of strain in lesions was performed in this study by measuring the elasticity index (E-index) and elasticity ratio (E-ratio) of lesions as semi-quantitative numerical indicators of the color distribution of strain. We examined whether ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) and intraductal papilloma could be distinguished using these semi-quantitative numerical indicators.

Methods: In this study, 170 ultrasonographically detected mass lesions in 162 cases (106 malignant lesions and 64 benign lesions)-in which tissue biopsy by core needle biopsy and vacuum-assisted biopsy, or surgically performed histopathological diagnosis, was performed-were selected as subjects from among 1978 consecutive cases (from January 2014 to December 2016) in which strain elastography images were acquired, in addition to standard B-mode breast ultrasonography, by measuring the E-index and E-ratio.

Results: The cut-off values for E-index and E-ratio in the malignant/benign discrimination of breast lesions were determined to be optimal values at 3.5 and 4.2, respectively, based on receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis. E-index sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, and AUC value (area under the curve) were 85%, 86%, 85%, and 0.860, respectively, while those for E-ratio were 78%, 74%, 74%, and 0.780, respectively. E-index yielded superior results in all aspects of sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, and AUC values, compared to those of E-ratio. The mean E-index values for malignant tumors and benign tumors were 4.46 and 2.63, respectively, indicating a significant difference (P < 0.001). E-index values of 24 DCIS lesions and 25 intraductal papillomas were 3.88 and 3.35, respectively, which showed a considerably close value, while the false-negative rate for DCIS was 29.2%, and the false-positive rate for intraductal papilloma was as high as 32.0%.

Conclusion: E-index in strain elastography yielded better results than E-ratio in the malignant/benign discrimination of breast diseases. On the other hand, E-index has a high false-negative rate and false-positive rate for intraductal lesions, a factor which should be taken into account when making ultrasound diagnoses.