Comparative study of three sonoelastographic scores for differentiation between benign and malignant cervical lymph nodes

Abstract Purpose The aim of the study was to explore the diagnostic value of three different sonoelastographic scoring systems (labeled S1–S3) for the differentiation between benign and malignant cervical lymph nodes. Materials and method The authors propose a six pattern scoring system of the elastographic images with pattern 1 – representing purely soft nodes, pattern 2 – predominantly soft nodes, pattern 3 – predominantly soft nodes with focal had area, pattern 4 – predominantly hard node, pattern 5 – entirely hard node and pattern 6 – node with necrosis. The sonoelastographic images of 50 benign and 70 malignant lymph nodes were assessed. The area under the ROC curve (AUROC) for the differentiation between benign vs. malignant and benign vs. metastatic nodes were analyzed for the three scoring systems. Results When all the malignant lymph nodes were considered, the S1 score showed an AUROC = 0.873 (95%CI [0.805–0.918], where CI = confidence interval; p p p p p p Conclusions Our study suggests that there are no significant differences between the three scoring systems in terms of overall diagnostic value.