Relationship of Shear-wave Elastography Findings with Breast Cancer Molecular Subtypes and Comparison with Other Radiological Imaging Techniques

Purpose: We aimed to evaluate the shear-wave elastography (SWE) findings of breast cancer and to compare their differences with other imaging techniques and to determine the rela-tionship between molecular subtypes. Methods: Radiological findings and histopathology results of patients who underwent biopsy due to breast mass and diagnosed as malignant were evaluated retrospectively. SWE findings, ultrasonography (US), mammography and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) findings were evaluated. The histo-pathology results of the tru-cut biopsy performed under the guidance of US-SWE were analyzed. The findings of SWE and other radiological techniques were compared statistically and relationship with molecular subtypes was evaluated. Results: We had 51 patients with a median age of 58 years. In SWE, the mean tumor size was 20 mm, and the tumor elasticity was 105 kPa. Statistically signi-ficant correlation was found between the tumor size differences measured by B mode US-SWE and the tumor elasticity value. No correlation was found between SWE findings and molecular subtypes. SWE had significantly high positive correlation with mamography and MRI in terms of lesion size, with US very high positive correlation and with ER positivity weak negative correlation. Conclusion: In addition to conventional radiological imaging techniques the use of SWE provides useful insight to evaluation of breast cancer.