Clinical value of computer-aided algorithm on radiologist's diagnosis of masses using breast ultrasound imaging / 中华超声影像学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To propose a novel computer-aided segment algorithm, and retrospectively investigate its effect on radiologist's sensitivity and specificity for discriminating malignant masses from benign masses basing on ultrasound images. Methods Four hundred and sixty-six images of 100 masses obtained by conventional ultrasound were processed by a novel segment algorithm. Radiologists who were blind to the histology results were invited to analyse the original and computerized images respectively. The sensitivity and specificity were calculated by means of a binary outcome using receiver operating characteristic(ROC) analysis. Results By using the segment algorithm, the quantity of the image was obviously improved, especially the margin and calcification of the masses. The diagnostic performance of the radiologists was also improved. The sensitivity rose from 70.32% to 90.52% while the specificity was 74.31%. The area under the ROC curve increased significantly (P<0.01) from 80.8% to 90.5%. Conclusions The proposed segmentation algorithm can improve the diagnosis performance of the radiologists by meliorating the quality of the ultrasound image.