Quantitative Ultrasound Assessment of Early Osteoarthritis in Human Articular Cartilage Using a High-Frequency Linear Array Transducer

Overview

Journal Ultrasound Med Biol

Specialty Radiology

Date 2022 May 10

PMID 35537895

Authors

Theresa H Lye

Omar Gachouch

Lisa Renner

Sefer Elezkurtaj

Hannes Cash

Daniel Messroghli

Kay Raum

Jonathan Mamou

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Quantitative ultrasound (QUS) assessment of osteoarthritis (OA) using high-frequency, research-grade single-element ultrasound systems has been reported. The objective of this ex vivo study was to assess the performance of QUS in detecting early OA using a high-frequency linear array transducer. Osteochondral plugs (n = 26) of human articular cartilage were scanned with ExactVu Micro-Ultrasound using an EV29L side-fire transducer. For comparison, the samples were also imaged with SAM200Ex, a custom 40-MHz scanning acoustic microscope with a single-element, focused transducer. Thirteen QUS parameters were derived from the ultrasound data. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data, with T1 and T2 extracted as the quantitative parameters, were also acquired for comparison. Cartilage degeneration was graded from histology and correlated to all quantitative parameters. A maximum Spearman rank correlation coefficient (ρ) of 0.75 was achieved using a combination of ExactVu QUS parameters, while a maximum ρ of 0.62 was achieved using a combination of parameters from SAM200Ex. A maximum ρ of 0.75 was achieved using the T1 and T2 MRI parameters. This study illustrates the potential of a high-frequency linear array transducer to provide a convenient method for early OA screening with results comparable to those of research-grade single-element ultrasound and MRI.

Citing Articles

Research progress of ultrasound in accurate evaluation of cartilage injury in osteoarthritis.

Zhang H, Ning E, Lu L, Zhou J, Shao Z, Yang X Front Endocrinol (Lausanne). 2024; 15:1420049.

PMID: 39211448 PMC: 11358554. DOI: 10.3389/fendo.2024.1420049.

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