A shear wave endoscopic elasticity imaging approach with micro focused piezoelectric transducer

Early diagnosis of the space occupying lesion in esophagus are crucial for the prevention of the esophageal carcinoma. Current methods are lack of the ability of measuring the quantitative elasticity. Combining the esophagoscopy with shear wave elasticity imaging, we propose an invasive approach to achieve both morphological and mechanical parameters of esophageal lesions. Furthermore, to overcome the drawback of the energy deficiency of the shear wave pushing beam, we design a novel esophagoscopy probe with micro focused piezoelectric transducer. The preliminary results show the feasibility of this work. The long-term purpose is to develop a thin, flexible esophagoscopy probe with an effective and stable invasive shear wave imaging algorithm that can provide real time elasticity imaging in clinical diagnosis of esophageal cancer.