Their study findings suggest that there's a role for ultrasound in liver cancer follow-up after minimally invasive treatment, wrote presenter Dr. Daniel Ohngemach of North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, NY, and colleagues.
"Minimally invasive treatments for hepatocellular carcinoma continue to rise in popularity," the group wrote. "Monitoring treated lesions for residual tumor has been accomplished by contrast-enhanced CT or MR; however, there is growing interest in the use of CEUS to monitor treatment response following thermoablation and embolization of hepatocellular carcinoma."
Ohngemach's team compared post-treatment findings on CEUS with findings on contrast-enhanced CT or MRI to assess the efficacy of using CEUS to monitor liver cancer treatment response. The study included 22 lesions imaged with both CEUS and CT or MRI.
CEUS demonstrated enhancement in 86.7% of lesions diagnostically confirmed on CT or MRI, and it did not show enhancement in any of the lesions with negative CT or MRI results, the group found.
"Contrast-enhanced ultrasound may potentially add value in the evaluation of treated hepatic lesions, particularly in patients with contraindications to contrast-enhanced MR or in whom MRI findings are inconclusive," Ohngemach and colleagues concluded.
