Evaluation of Ultrasonic Scores in Differential Diagnosis of Breast Solid Lesions

Abstract

The objective of this study was to evaluate the performance of ultrasonic scores in the differential diagnosis of breast solid lesions. In all, 135 lesions of 125 cases were analyzed, including 62 benign lesions and 73 malignant lesions. Pathology was used as the gold-standard diagnostic criterion. All the sonographic features of breast lesions were recorded routinely by high-frequency sonography, every feature was graded, and the total scores for each lesion were calculated. The results indicated that there were significant differences in ultrasonic scores between benign and malignant lesions in the shape, margin, capsule, attenuation, microcalcification, and blood flow ( P < .001), and there were differences in ultrasonic scores in the length-to-width ratio and internal echoes ( P < .05). Consequently, the higher the total ultrasonic scores, the increased possibility there was of malignant lesions. The sensitivity and specificity to distinguish breast malignant lesions from benign ones were 84.9% and 88.9%, respectively, and the area (Az) under the receiver operating characteristic curve of diagnosis was 0.915 if the cutoff value of the total ultrasonic scores was 13.5. This promising performance of ultrasonic scores in analyzing the sonographic features for differentiation between benign and malignant lesions semi-quantitatively can increase the diagnostic accuracy of breast solid lesions.