Differential diagnosis between renal benign and malignant tumors with three-dimensional contrast-enhanced ultrasound

Objective To assess the differential diagnosis and characteristics of renal benign and malignant tumors with three-dimensional contrast-enhanced ultrasound (3D-CEUS). Methods Totally 68 patients with renal tumors were examined by conventional ultrasound and two-dimensional contrastenhanced ultrasound(2D-CEUS). 3D imaging was reconstructed from 2D imaging, the differential diagnosis of renal tumors with 3D-CEUS was analyzed by comparing with 2D-CEUS. All patients with renal tumors were proved by operational pathology. Results Eighteen patients with renal benign tumors mostly displayed equal or low enhancement, showed in and slowly out with 2D-CEUS, while displayed regular peripheral and internal vessels with 3D-CEUS. Fifty patients with renal malignant tumors mostly displayed high enhancement, showed in and rapidly out with 2D-CEUS,displayed winding peripheral vessels and disordered internal vessels with 3D-CEUS. 3D-CEUS may display the vascular characteristics of tumors and showed superior imaging quality to 2D-CEUS ( P ＜ 0.05). Conclusions 3D-CEUS can display the vascular characteristics of tumors and their spatial positions, it plays an important role in differential diagnosis between renal benign and malignant tumors. Key words: Ultrasonography, three-dimensional;  Microbubbles;  Kidney neoplasms;  Diagnosis,differential