Analysis of vascularization in thyroid gland nodes with superb microvascular imaging (SMI) and CD34 expression histology: a pilot study

Table 2 Differences between nodes with respect to vascularization parameters quantitatively determined with ImageJ and SMI

Variables	Benign (N = 13)		Malignant (N = 3)		p-value
Variables	Mean ± SD	Median (range)	Mean ± SD	Median (range)	p-value
ROI longitudinal	25.30 ± 10.69	22.33 (9.93–44.67)	26.55 ± 0.79	26.12 (26.07–27.46)	0.5905
ROI longitudinal area fraction (%)	0.25 ± 0.13	0.28 (0.02–0.43)	0.31 ± 0.04	0.30(0.27–0.35)	0.5905
ROI cross (mm²)	27.62 ± 11.13	23.68 (9.46–47.53)	24.11 ± 7.31	28.15 (15.68–28.51)	0.7879
ROI cross area fraction (%)	0.29 ± 0.15	0.27 (0.01–0.55)	0.23 ± 0.09	0.28 (0.12–0.28)	0.6865
Quotient longitudinal	0.88 ± 0.35	0.82 (0.37–1.67)	1.13 ± 0.46	1.18 (0.64–1.56)	0.5012
Quotient longitudinal area fraction	0.85 ± 0.66	0.64 (0.08–2.61)	2.75 ± 3.02	1.59 (0.48–6.17)	0.2818
Quotient all	0.88 ± 0.44	0.89 (0.28–1.54)	1.07 ± 0.05	1.07 (1.02–1.12)	0.4273
Quotient all area fraction	0.88 ± 0.89	0.58(0.14–3.28)	1.13 ± 0.19	1.21 (0.91–1.26)	0.2790

ROI: region of interest; longitudinal: longitudinal view of the ROI; area fraction: fraction of the area with blood flow compared to the total ROI area; cross: cross-sectional view of the ROI; Quotient: the indicated parameter measured in the thyroid gland lesion area (ROI-A) divided by the same parameter measured in the parenchymal tissue adjacent to the lesion (ROI-B); all: the quantified vascularization values measured in the total nodal area, divided by their counterparts measured in the parenchymal area, near the node in the same ROI

ISSN: 1471-2342