Quantitative ultrasound assessment of breast tumor response to chemotherapy using a multi-parameter approach

Abstract

This study demonstrated for the first time, using new parameters tested on relatively large patient cohort and leave-one-out classifier evaluation, that a hybrid QUS biomarker including MBF, SS, and SAS could, with relatively high sensitivity and specificity, detect the response of LABC tumors to NAC as early as after 4 weeks of therapy. The findings of this study also suggested that incorporating pre-treatment QUS parameters of a tumor improved the classification results. This work demonstrated the potential of QUS and machine learning methods for the early assessment of breast tumor response to NAC and providing personalized medicine with regards to the treatment planning of refractory patients.