A novel shape‐similarity‐based elastography technique for prostate cancer assessment. Issue 9 (10th August 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Mousavi, Seyed Reza; Wang, Haisu; Hesabgar, Seyyed Mohammad; Scholl, Timothy J.; Samani, Abbas
• Is Part Of: Medical physics. Volume 42:Issue 9(2015)
• Page Start: 5110
• Page End: 5119
• Publication Date: 2015-08-10
• Subjects: biological organs -- biomechanics -- biomedical MRI -- biomedical ultrasonics -- cancer -- compressibility -- elastic constants -- elastic deformation -- elasticity -- feature extraction -- image reconstruction -- medical image processing -- phantoms -- tumours -- ultrasonic imaging; Elastic properties -- Reconstruction -- Clinical applications -- Ultrasonographic imaging -- Artifacts and distortion -- Cancer; Involving electronic [emr] or nuclear [nmr] magnetic resonance, e.g. magnetic resonance imaging -- Diagnosis using ultrasonic, sonic or infrasonic waves -- Biological material, e.g. blood, urine; Haemocytometers -- Digital computing or data processing equipment or methods, specially adapted for specific applications -- Image data processing or generation, in general; prostate cancer -- elastography -- Young's modulus -- optimization -- tissue‐mimicking phantom; Ultrasonography -- Cancer -- Magnetic resonance imaging -- Medical image segmentation -- Elastic moduli -- Medical image reconstruction -- Finite element methods -- Tissues; Medical physics -- Periodicals; Medical physics; Geneeskunde; Natuurkunde; Toepassingen; Biophysics; Periodicals; Periodicals; Electronic journals; 610.153
• DOI: 10.1118/1.4927572
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0094-2405

Abstract

Abstract : Purpose: Association between tissue stiffness alteration and pathology is well known. This has formed the basis for prostate elastography imaging techniques where images of prostate tissue mechanical properties are reconstructed. In this paper, the authors present a novel prostate elastography technique which, unlike other techniques, relies on magnitude image data only. Methods: This proposed technique works in conjunction with ultrasound or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) imaging modalities and it requires the prostate's pre‐ and postdeformation images as input. It uses a constrained reconstruction method where the elastic moduli of the prostate's normal and pathological tissues are determined based on an essential subset of the tissue deformation provided by the images data. The elasticity reconstruction technique uses optimization where similarity between calculated and observed shape features of the postcompression prostate image is maximized. The method was validated with an in silico phantom study followed by studies using ultrasound and MR with tissue‐mimicking phantoms. Results: Using the proposed methods, it was observed that the maximum uncertainties of the reconstructed Young's modulus ratios of tumor to normal tissue were 15.6% and 9.7%, which were obtained from the transrectal ultrasound (TRUS) and MR tissue‐mimicking phantom studies, respectively. Conclusions: This novel prostate elastography technique relies on prostate TRUS or MRI images that can be routinely acquired without additional imaging hardware. The phantom studies provided evidence that the proposed technique has a good potential to reconstruct prostate stiffness maps noninvasively particularly when applied in conjunction with MRI. Further studies are necessary to evaluate the technique's merits for clinical use.