Identifying malignant and benign breast lesions using vibroelastography

Vibroelastography is a technique to measure tissue elasticity using a multi-frequency shear wave approach. The method uses ultrasound to image dynamic deformation of soft tissue while an actuator applies surface vibrations. In this paper we evaluate vibroelastography for the first time in differentiating between malignant and benign breast lesions. A dataset of 20 lesions, including fibroadenoma and invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC) lesions was analysed. Ultrasound radio-frequency data were captured while the breast tissue was vibrated with a snap-on actuator at multiple frequencies at an amplitude of less than 100 microns. After the VE exam, the subjects underwent core-needle biopsy. The pathology report was used as the ground truth to validate the VE result. The VE results indicate that both benign fibroadenoma and IDC result in hardening of the tissue; however, IDC lesions exhibits higher values of elasticity compared to benign masses which can be captured using absolute and relative elasticity maps provided by VE.