Evaluating the role of strain ratio elastography in determining malignancy potential and calculating objective BIRADS US scores using ultrasonography and elastography features

Purpose
The aims of this study were, firstly, to evaluate solid breast masses based on their malignancy potential and to determine whether the strain elastography ratio (SER) can contribute to classical grey-scale ultrasonography findings, and secondly, to define objective BIRADS US scores using ultrasound (US) and SER findings.

Material and methods
A total of 280 patients and 297 solid breast masses were evaluated using sonographic and elastographic data. The SER was measured for each lesion.

Results
The positive predictive values (PPV) for each criterion was calculated to be between 35% and 83.3%. The lowest PPV was obtained from hypoechogenicity (35%) and the highest PPV was obtained for anti-parallel features (83.3%). The difference between the mean SER of benign and malignant lesions was statistically significant. After ROC analysis, the SER cut-off value was calculated to be 3.1 for determining if the mass was benign or malignant. Mass scores were calculated for each solid breast mass based on positive predictive values, and BIRADS US score was defined as the sum of mass scores.

Conclusions
SER findings can be used as malignancy criteria in evaluating solid breast masses. BIRADS US score can be objectively determined based on US and elastography features instead of doing subjective scoring. As an additional result, all solid breast masses have the possibility to be malignant, even though US and elastography findings indicate the opposite.