Hepatic ultrasonic tissue characterization of video image data.

A study measuring in vivo three quantitative parameters of human liver was performed to assess the feasibility of measuring these parameters using standard ultrasound equipment and technique and to evaluate their potential for diagnosing diffuse liver disease. The parameters measured were: (1) d-bar, the average scatter spacing between semiperiodic scatterer; (2) r, a measure of the relative scattering strength; and (3) sigma, a measure of the variability in the relative scattering strength. Using linear discriminant and multivariate analysis, the above parameters are able to significantly separate normal livers from those with cirrhosis. This technique shows promise in the clinical identification of diffuse liver disease.