Seventy-nine patients with 82 breast lesions were examined by conventional ultrasound and diagnosed as Breast Imaging Reporting and Data System (BI-RADS) level 3 or 4. CDFI detected no PVs; subsequently, Power Doppler (PD), Advanced Dynamic Flow (ADF), and SMI were performed to detect any PVs in the breast lesions.
Compared with PD or ADF, SMI revealed significantly (P < 0.01) higher median numbers of PVs in breast lesions. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was 0.914 before the corrected classification versus 0.947 after the corrected classification (P < 0.05).
SMI was helpful in the differential diagnosis of benign versus malignant in avascular breast lesions, especially those in BI-RADS category 4.