High Standard Trolley Fully Digital Ultrasound Scanner
Elasticity Imaging in Healthcare
Introduction
Tissue elasticity offers clinically significant information on
tumor and lesion growth, including early state characterization
that may greatly assist early diagnosis. We present
visualization of tissue elasticity through two methods:
1) Freehand elastography using manual probe compression
2) Sound-Push© elastography & shear wave speed
estimation using ARFI
Freehand elastography
Motion tracking of manual compression or breathing
induced movement generates a strain image
representing the elasticity of the underlying tissue. Saset
has one issued patent and our lab in collaboration with
Sichuan University has 17 published academic papers
and 7 PhD theses.
Wave Speed estimation
Saset introduces Sound-Push© elastography, with two pending
patents, which does not require manual compression as it is
based on transmitting high energy pulses to acoustically push
the tissue. This technique results in more accurate strain
images. Moreover, Saset offers shear wave speed estimation
which can diagnosis liver fibrosis diseases quantitatively.
Figure 4. ARFI image of the edema (the white spot in the
right picture) in early Achilles tendon injury
Experimental verification and accuracy analysis
In our lab, we have verified our Sound-Push© elastography using
Model 049, CIRS Elasticity QA phantom, with results between
1.25% and 4.44% error using four types of hard/soft lesions.
Additionally, we verified shear wave speed estimation using
Model 039, CIRS Shear Wave Liver Fibrosis Phantom, with
1.61% to 6.37% error (from 4 to 44.4 kPa Young’s modulus)