TY - JOUR
T1 - A Phantom-Based Assessment of Repeatability and Reproducibility of Transvaginal Quantitative Ultrasound
AU - Chen, Shi
AU - McFarlin, Barbara L.
AU - Meagher, Barbara T.
AU - Peters, Tara A.
AU - Simpson, Douglas G.
AU - O'Brien, William D.
AU - Han, Aiguo
N1 - Funding Information:
Manuscript received February 1, 2019; accepted June 5, 2019. Date of publication June 14, 2019; date of current version August 26, 2019. This work was supported in part by the National Institutes of Health Grant R01 HD089935. (Corresponding author: Aiguo Han.) S. Chen, W. D. O’Brien, Jr., and A. Han are with the Bioacoustics Research Laboratory, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801 USA (e-mail: chenshi613@gmail.com; wdo@uiuc.edu; han51@illinois.edu).
Publisher Copyright:
© 1986-2012 IEEE.
PY - 2019
Y1 - 2019
N2 - This article evaluated the repeatability and reproducibility (R&R) of quantitative ultrasound (QUS) biomarkers attenuation coefficient (AC) and backscatter coefficient (BSC) in transvaginal QUS reference phantoms for obstetric applications. Five phantoms were scanned by three sonographers according to the scanning protocol. Each sonographer scanned each phantom with four transvaginal transducers of the same model (MC9-4) and three probe cover types (latex cover, nonlatex cover, and no cover). The AC and BSC were estimated by using a reference phantom method. The R&R analysis was performed for the frequency-averaged AC and logBSC (= 10log10BSC) (5.4-5.8 MHz) by using three-factor random effects Analysis of Variance with interaction. The total R&R variabilities for AC and logBSC are small (AC: 0.042-0.065 dB/cm-MHz; logBSC: 0.50-0.68 dB), indicating high measurement precision. These values are small compared to the ranges of AC (0.28-0.99 dB/cm-MHz) and logBSC (-33.16 to-20.35 dB) of the five phantoms. The AC and logBSC biomarkers measured on transvaginal QUS phantoms using the reference phantom method are repeatable, and reproducible between sonographers, transducers, and probe covers.
AB - This article evaluated the repeatability and reproducibility (R&R) of quantitative ultrasound (QUS) biomarkers attenuation coefficient (AC) and backscatter coefficient (BSC) in transvaginal QUS reference phantoms for obstetric applications. Five phantoms were scanned by three sonographers according to the scanning protocol. Each sonographer scanned each phantom with four transvaginal transducers of the same model (MC9-4) and three probe cover types (latex cover, nonlatex cover, and no cover). The AC and BSC were estimated by using a reference phantom method. The R&R analysis was performed for the frequency-averaged AC and logBSC (= 10log10BSC) (5.4-5.8 MHz) by using three-factor random effects Analysis of Variance with interaction. The total R&R variabilities for AC and logBSC are small (AC: 0.042-0.065 dB/cm-MHz; logBSC: 0.50-0.68 dB), indicating high measurement precision. These values are small compared to the ranges of AC (0.28-0.99 dB/cm-MHz) and logBSC (-33.16 to-20.35 dB) of the five phantoms. The AC and logBSC biomarkers measured on transvaginal QUS phantoms using the reference phantom method are repeatable, and reproducible between sonographers, transducers, and probe covers.
KW - Attenuation coefficient (AC)
KW - backscatter coefficient (BSC)
KW - quantitative ultrasound (QUS)
KW - repeatability and reproducibility (R&R)
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85071786781&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85071786781&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1109/TUFFC.2019.2921925
DO - 10.1109/TUFFC.2019.2921925
M3 - Article
C2 - 31217100
AN - SCOPUS:85071786781
SN - 0885-3010
VL - 66
SP - 1413
EP - 1421
JO - IEEE Transactions on Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics, and Frequency Control
JF - IEEE Transactions on Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics, and Frequency Control
IS - 9
M1 - 8736856
ER -