Comparison of Magnetic Resonance Imaging and Contrast-Enhanced Ultrasound as Diagnostic Options for Unclear Cystic Renal Lesions: A Cost-Effectiveness Analysis.

Purpose:  Correct differentiation between malignant and benign incidentally found cystic renal lesions has critical implications for patient management. In several studies contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) showed higher sensitivity with respect to the accurate characterization of these lesions compared to MRI, but the cost-effectiveness of CEUS has yet to be investigated. The aim of this study was to analyze the cost-effectiveness of CEUS as an alternative imaging method to MRI for the characterization of incidentally found cystic renal lesions.

Long-term study analysis of contrast-enhanced ultrasound in the diagnosis of focal nodular hyperplasia.

Background: Focal nodular hyperplasia (FNH) is a hyperplastic mass of vascular abnormality and the second most common benign liver lesion. It can be discovered incidentally or during a surveillance examination in patients at risk for hepatic malignancy, mostly by conventional ultrasound. CEUS has been used as an additional alternative method for the rapid diagnosis of FNH.

Performance of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) compared to MRI in the diagnostic of gallbladder diseases.

Background: Conventional ultrasound and MRI are very important techniques for the detection of gallbladder alterations. In the past years, studies showed that the additional use of contrast media to the conventional ultrasound allows the early depiction of pathological microvessels and their flow elucidating suspect findings stipulating the prompt therapy approach.

Objective: The study aims to evaluate the performance of CEUS in gallbladder diseases and compare it to MR imaging using histopathological findings as a gold standard.

Single-Center Study: Evaluating the Diagnostic Performance and Safety of Contrast-Enhanced Ultrasound (CEUS) in Pregnant Women to Assess Hepatic Lesions.

Background:  Ultrasound is an essential imaging tool for evaluating physiological and pathological fetal or maternal conditions during pregnancy. Published data is limited with respect to the application of CEUS during pregnancy. CEUS has already been safely applied for assessing uteroplacental blood flow, cesarean scar pregnancy and invasive placenta percreta.

Contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) and gallbladder diseases - A retrospective mono-center analysis of imaging findings with histopathological correlation.

Background: Radiologic imaging, especially ultrasound has an important role in the assessment of gallbladder alteration. Contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) is an easy and fast imaging technique that overcomes the limitations of greyscale ultrasonography. It is a safe tool that can be used as an additional imaging modality in order to elucidate and differentiate gallbladder pathological findings.

Contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) for the evaluation of gallbladder diseases in comparison to cross-sectional imaging modalities and histopathological results.

Background: The first method of choice for gallbladder alteration detection is the conventional ultrasound. Due to some imaging limitations, contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) has been widely used in the last years. CEUS is an additional modality that is able to depict microvessels flow and elucidate suspicious findings.

Detection and monitoring of postinterventional success and complications of the liver using contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) - a case report after interventional treatment of a giant hemangioma.

This case report relates the use of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) for the assessment and treatment of a postinterventional cholecystitis, a rare but important complication after transcatheter arterial embolization of a giant hemangioma. Regarding the imaging diagnosis, hemangiomas have specific features allowing a fast recognition by all radiological modalities,and in recent years, especially by CEUS.

Ultrasound and contrast enhanced ultrasound imaging in the diagnosis of acute aortic pathologies.

Conventional ultrasound is worldwide the first-line imaging modality for the prompt diagnosis in the daily practice because it is a cost-effective and easy to perform technique. The additional application of contrast media has been used to enhance the intravascular contrast and to improve the imaging diagnostic accuracy in the detection, classification and follow-up of vascular pathologies. Contrast-enhanced ultrasound has the advantage of being a safe, fast and dynamic non-invasive imaging tool with excellent results in the diagnosis of acute aortic pathologies, especially the detection of endoleaks after endovascular aneurysm repair.

Evaluation of renal lesions using contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS); a 10-year retrospective European single-centre analysis.

Objective: To investigate the usefulness of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) in the evaluation of renal masses.

Methods: This study included 255 patients with renal masses. Ages ranged from 18-86 years.

Diagnostic performance of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) for the evaluation of gallbladder diseases1.

Background: Contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) has been used as an additional imaging technique to conventional ultrasound in order to clarify gallbladder findings, CEUS is easy and fast to perform, overcomes the limitations of gray-scale ultrasonography and is a safe tool.

Objective: The aim of this retrospective mono-center analysis study is to evaluate the diagnostic performance of CEUS in the assessment of gallbladder disease by comparing its results with additional CT findings.

Methods: A total of 24 patients between 2009 and 2017 with unclear gallbladder appearance were retrospectively analysed.

Diagnostic accuracy of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) in monitoring vascular complications in patients after liver transplantation - diagnostic performance compared with histopathological results.

Purpose: To analyse the diagnostic performance of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) in patients with vascular complications and transplant rejection compared to histopathological results.

Materials And Methods: Our study consisted of 45 retrospectively analysed patients that underwent liver transplantations between January 1993 and December 2015 and developed post-transplant vascular complications with transplant rejection. CEUS examinations took place between September 2006 and December 2015.

Contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) prediction of focal liver lesions in patients after liver transplantation in comparison to histopathology results.

Purpose: To investigate the value of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) in histologic prediction of focal liver lesions after liver transplantation.

Materials And Methods: 10 focal liver lesions in 10 patients after liver transplantation were scanned using CEUS and the CEUS results were compared with the histopathological results.

Results: Among 10 focal liver lesions, 7 proofed to be histopathological benign and 3 lesions proofed to be histopathological malignant.

The value of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) using a high-end ultrasound system in the characterization of endoleaks after endovascular aortic repair (EVAR).

Purpose: To evaluate the value of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) using a high-end ultrasound system in the characterization of endoleaks after endovascular aortic repair (EVAR).

Material And Methods: In this mono-center study, 41 patients were retrospectively analyzed after being examined using a modern high-end ultrasound system (RS80A with Prestige, Samsung Medison Co., Ltd.

Contrast-Enhanced Ultrasound in the Follow-Up of Endoleaks after Endovascular Aortic Repair (EVAR).

Endovascular aortic repair (EVAR) has become established in the treatment of abdominal aortic aneurysms and shows potential benefits such as a low perioperative morbidity and a short hospitalization duration. The follow-up after EVAR primarily consists of lifelong postinterventional imaging of the aneurysm size in order to detect complications such as endoleaks or stent dislocation. Computed tomography angiography, an imaging modality that uses ionizing radiation and that relies on a contrast medium which is dependent on thyroid and renal function, is widely used for follow-up.

MRI and contrast enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) image fusion of renal lesions.

Ultrasound is a common and established imaging method for the initial characterization of renal lesions. The widespread used Bosniak classification (I-IV) classifies renal lesions in five individual groups using contrast-enhanced computer tomography (CE-CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and/or contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) imaging criteria. For complex pathologies, CEUS/MRI image fusion is a novel imaging technique for the differentiation of benign and malignant renal lesions.

Differences of standard values of Supersonic shear imaging and ARFI technique - in vivo study of testicular tissue.

Purpose: To investigate the difference of standard values of Supersonic shear imaging (SSI) and Acoustic Radiation Force Impulse (ARFI) technique in the evaluation of testicular tissue stiffness in vivo.

Materials And Methods: 58 healthy male testes were examined using B-mode sonography and ARFI and SSI. B-mode sonography was performed in order to scan the testis for pathologies followed by performance of real-time elastography in three predefined areas (upper pole, central portion and lower pole) using the SuperSonic® Aixplorer ultrasound device (SuperSonic Imagine, Aix-en-Provence, France).

Comparison of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) in the evaluation of unclear solid renal lesions.

Purpose: To compare the sensitivity and specificity of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in the evaluation of unclear renal lesions to the histopathological outcome.

Materials And Methods: A total of 36 patients with a single unclear solid renal lesion with initial imaging studies between 2005 and 2015 were included. CEUS and MRI were used for determining malignancy or benignancy and initial findings were correlated with the histopathological outcome.

Diagnostic vascular ultrasonography with the help of color Doppler and contrast-enhanced ultrasonography.

The use of ultrasonography and especially of contrast-enhanced ultrasonography (CEUS) in the diagnosis of vascular pathologies before and after interventions has significantly increased over the past years due to the broader availability of modern ultrasound systems with CEUS capabilities and more trained user experience in this imaging modality. For the preinterventional and postinterventional work-up of carotid diseases, duplex ultrasound as well as CEUS have been established as the standard-of-care examination procedures for diagnosis, evaluation, and follow-up. In addition to its use for carotid arterial diseases, ultrasonography has also become the primary modality for the screening of vascular pathologies.

Contrast-Enhanced Ultrasound (CEUS) of the Kidneys by Using the Bosniak Classification.

Ultrasound is the most used interdisciplinary non-ionizing imaging technique in clinical routine. Therefore, ultrasound has a special value in the diagnosis and monitoring of cystic renal lesions, which can be classified as non-complicated or complicated and by means of occurrence as solitary or multifocal lesions. The Bosniak classification (I-IV) classifies renal cysts in 5 different categories with the help of ultrasound and computed tomography image criteria and is used for decisions of further clinical treatment.

Shear-wave elastography of the testis in the healthy man - determination of standard values.

Purpose: Real-time shear-wave elastography (SWE) is a newly developed technique for the sonographic quantification of tissue elasticity, which already is used in the assessment of breast and thyroid lesions. Due to limited overlying tissue, the testes are ideally suited for assessment using shear wave elastography. To our knowledge, no published data exist on real-time SWE of the testes.

Parametric imaging of clear cell and papillary renal cell carcinoma using contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS).

Purpose: The aim of this study was to analyse clear cell and papillary renal cell carcinoma (RCC) examined with contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) and a second generation blood pool agent (SonoVue®, Bracco, Milan, Italy) before clinical intervention.

Materials And Methods: A total of 41 patients with histologically proven subtypes of RCC were examined. 29 patients had a clear cell RCC and 12 patients showed a papillary RCC.

Characterization of histological subtypes of clear cell renal cell carcinoma using contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS).

Introduction: The aim of this study was to analyze the histological subtypes of clear cell renal cell carcinoma (RCC) examined by means of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) and a second generation blood pool agent (SonoVue®, Bracco, Milan, Italy) during the pre-operative phase.

Materials And Methods: 29 patients with histologically proven subtypes of clear cell RCC were examined. A total of three patients were diagnosed with highly differentiated clear cell RCC, 21 out of 29 cases with moderately differentiated clear cell RCC and five out of 29 patients had insufficiently differentiated clear cell RCC.

Atherosclerosis aggravates ischemia/reperfusion injury in the gut and remote damage in the liver and the lung.

Objective: We investigated whether mesenteric ischemia/reperfusion (I/R)-associated gut injury and remote liver and lung damage are affected by prevalent atherosclerosis.

Methods: Mesenteric ischemia was induced in atherosclerotic ApoE-deficient (ApoE(-/-)) and control C57BL/6 mice by clamping the superior mesenteric artery for 30 min. Mesenteric microcirculatory dysfunction and leukocytic inflammation were studied in the terminal ileum by intravital fluorescence microscopy (IVM).