Wan Yung-Liang, Tai Dar-In, Ma Hsiang-Yang, Chiang Bing-Hao, Chen Chin-Kuo, Tsui Po-Hsiang
Department of Medical Imaging and Intervention, Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Linkou, Taoyuan City, Taiwan Department of Medical Imaging and Radiological Sciences, College of Medicine, Chang Gung University, Taoyuan City, Taiwan.
Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Linkou, Chang Gung University, Taoyuan City, Taiwan.
Proc Inst Mech Eng H. 2015 Jun;229(6):419-28. doi: 10.1177/0954411915585864. Epub 2015 May 11.
Ultrasound imaging has been widely applied to screen fatty liver disease. Fatty liver disease is a condition where large vacuoles of triglyceride fat accumulate in liver cells, thereby altering the arrangement of scatterers and the corresponding backscattered statistics. In this study, we used ultrasound Nakagami imaging to explore the effects of fatty infiltration in human livers on the statistical distribution of backscattered signals. A total of 107 patients volunteered to participate in the experiments. The livers were scanned using a clinical ultrasound scanner to obtain the raw backscattered signals for ultrasound B-mode and Nakagami imaging. Clinical scores of fatty liver disease for each patient were determined according to a well-accepted sonographic scoring system. The results showed that the Nakagami image can visualize the local backscattering properties of liver tissues. The Nakagami parameter increased from 0.62 ± 0.11 to 1.02 ± 0.07 as the fatty liver disease stage increased from normal to severe, indicating that the backscattered statistics vary from pre-Rayleigh to Rayleigh distributions. A significant positive correlation (correlation coefficient ρ = 0.84; probability value (p value) < 0.0001) exists between the degree of fatty infiltration and the Nakagami parameter, suggesting that ultrasound Nakagami imaging has potentials in future applications in fatty liver disease diagnosis.
超声成像已被广泛应用于脂肪肝疾病的筛查。脂肪肝疾病是一种肝细胞中积累大量甘油三酯脂肪空泡的病症，从而改变了散射体的排列以及相应的后向散射统计特性。在本研究中，我们使用超声中谷成像来探究人体肝脏脂肪浸润对后向散射信号统计分布的影响。共有107名患者自愿参与实验。使用临床超声扫描仪对肝脏进行扫描，以获取超声B模式和中谷成像的原始后向散射信号。根据一种广泛认可的超声评分系统确定每位患者的脂肪肝疾病临床评分。结果表明，中谷图像可以可视化肝脏组织的局部后向散射特性。随着脂肪肝疾病阶段从正常发展到严重，中谷参数从0.62±0.11增加到1.02±0.07，这表明后向散射统计特性从瑞利前分布变为瑞利分布。脂肪浸润程度与中谷参数之间存在显著正相关（相关系数ρ = 0.84；概率值（p值）<0.0001），这表明超声中谷成像在未来脂肪肝疾病诊断应用中具有潜力。
