Elastography is a non-invasive imaging modality that detects tumors based on their stiffness (elasticity) compared to normal tissue. Generally breast cancer tissue is harder than normal breast tissue. With elastography the elastic properties of breast tissue can be imaged in real time by means of color-coded superimposition on the B mode image and then used for differentiating between benign and malignant breast lesions (8).
Elastography is a supplementary method for conventional US used for the diagnostic confirmation by defining the degree of tissue stiffness. The principle of Elastography is to define the response given by tissue to compression resulting in deformation within the tissue; in other words, as the tissue becomes harder, its displacement occurs at a lower rate. Elastography allows physicians to calculate tissue elasticity by superimposing the information in color on B-mode images, with each color showing a specific level of elasticity. Thus, Elastography enables us to obtain objective data on tissue …show more content…
The mean age for all patients was 45.3 years (age range, 20 -70 years). The 14 patients with benign lesions had a mean age of 37.8 years, and the 16 patients with malignant lesions had a mean age of 51.9 years. It was found that the mean age for malignant lesions was higher than that for benign lesions and this difference was statistically significant (P = 0.002).
This comes in agreement with the study of Bojanic et al. (10) who found that the mean age for benign lesions was 50 years and the mean age for malignant lesions was 63