Real-time ultrasound elastography in 180 axillary lymph nodes: elasticity distribution in healthy lymph nodes and prediction of breast cancer metastases

Table 2 Predominant color of the cortex in sonoelastography with respect to healthy and metastatic LNs

Cortex	Group 1 healthy LNs n=165	Group 2 metastatic LNs n=15	p (pairwise comparison)
red (soft)	0%	0%	n.a.
yellow	1.2%	0%	n.s. (1.000)
green	13.9%	0%	n.s. (0.223)
turquoise	64.2%	40.0%	n.s. (0.093)
blue (hard)	20.6%	60.0%	0.001
p-value (multivariate analysis)	0.006

The cortex of metastatic LNs is significantly harder and therefore significantly more often described as blue than the cortex of healthy LNs. (n.s. = not significant, n.a. = not applicable, LN = lymph node).

ISSN: 1471-2342