Irreversible Electroporation in Patients With Liver Tumours: Treated-area Patterns With Contrast-enhanced Ultrasound

Abstract Background: To describe the contrast-enhanced ultrasound imaging findings of liver tumours after percutaneous ablation by irreversible electroporation (IRE). Methods: A prospective study of 21 malignant liver tumours (19 primary hepatic tumours and 2 hepatic metastases) treated by IRE ablation was performed. The ablation zones were evaluated by two examiners in a consensus reading performed immediately, 1 day, and 1 month after IRE ablation. The gold standard method with which the effectiveness of the treatment at 1 month is compared, is MRI. Results: Immediately after IRE ablation and up to 1 month later, the ablation zones gradually changed from hypo-echogenicity to hyper-echogenicity on conventional ultrasound, and becomes non-enhancement on contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS). There was substantial agreement (κ = 0.77, p < 0.05) between the results obtained with CEUS and those obtained with MRI 1 month after IRE ablation. Conclusions: We conclude that CEUS could be an effective tool for assessing post-irreversible electroporation ablation changes after 1 month. CEUS enables the depiction of tumour vascularity in real time and provides an easy, repeatable way.