Value of multiparametric ultrasonography in the differential diagnosis of benign and malignant testicular lesions / 中华超声影像学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To explore the value of multiparametric ultrasonography consisting of gray-scale ultrasound(US), color Doppler flow imaging (CDFI), real-time strain elastography(RTE), and contrast-enhanced ultrasound(CEUS) in the differential diagnosis of testicular lesions.Methods:Forty patients (40 lesions) detected by ultrasonography examination at the Ultrasound Medical Center of Lanzhou University Second Hospital from June 2020 to June 2022 were retrospectively analyzed, and further the CDFI, CEUS and RTE were performed. The presence of vascularization in the lesion was determined by CDFI and CEUS, avascular lesions were defined as benign, vascularization lesions were defined as malignant. The lesion tissue elasticity was assessed by real-time strain elastography, tissue stiffness was encoded as red(soft), green(intermediate), and blue(hard), and the hard lesions were defined as malignant, soft lesions were defined as benign. All lesions were subjected to pathological histologic examination after surgical resection or puncture biopsy as a reference standard. The correct classification rate, sensitivity, specificity and likelihood ratio of the multiparametric ultrasonography imaging for the diagnosis of benign and malignant testicular lesions were analyzed by ROC.Results:Of 40 testicular lesions, 24 (60.0%) were benign and 16 (40.0%) were malignant. The sensitivity of CDFI, CEUS and RTE in the diagnosis of testicular lesions was 0.875, 1.000 and 1.000, and the specificity was 0.833, 0.750 and 0.708, respectively. The correct classification rate was 85.0%, 85.0% and 82.5%, and the positive likelihood ratio was 5.24, 4.00 and 4.42, respectively. AUC was 0.781, 0.802, 0.771, respectively. By combining RTE and CDFI, a sensitivity of 1.000 and specificity of 0.875 and correct classification rate of 92.8% and positive likelihood ratio of 8.00 and AUC of 0.915 ( P<0.001) were achieved in differentiating testicular lesions. And combining RTE and CEUS, achieved sensitivity of 1.000 and specificity of 0.917 and correct classification rate of 95.0% and positive likelihood ratio of 12.0 and AUC of 0.958( P<0.001). Conclusions:Multiparametric US is of great value in the differential diagnosis of benign and malignant testicular lesions.