Diffuse shear wave elastography in a thin plate phantom

Abnormal biomechanical properties of the myocardium, such as increased passive stiffness, prevent the heart of patients with diastolic heart failure to completely relax during diastole. Therefore, non-invasively measuring the stiffness is of importance. In this study, we used shear wave propagation velocities as a measure of stiffness of a thin plate phantom. We tested the applicability of a spatio-temporal correlation technique to determine these velocities of diffuse fields in a thin plate. The obtained velocities were similar to the results found with direct shear wave measurements. We also show that velocities are overestimated in non-completely diffuse wave fields with out-of-plane propagation.