Performance Evaluation of Displacement Estimation Methods for Early-Stage Breast Cancer Tumor Detection Using Strain Elastography

Displacement estimation methods in strain elastography use ultrasound signals to estimate displacements and strain in soft tissue. Although several methods exist, systematic comparisons under controlled simulation conditions for lesions smaller than 5 mm are limited. Evaluating axial accuracy for superficial and intermediate depths in small breast cancer lesions is clinically important, as early-stage detection with existing techniques remains challenging. In this study, speckle tracking, the Doppler method, and the combined autocorrelation method (CAM) were used to estimate axial displacements from simulated elastography signals. The performance of these methods was assessed using the root mean square error (RMSE) for displacement field, strain, and tumor size estimation in a three-layer model comprising healthy tissue–tumor–healthy tissue. An extended analysis considering anatomically realistic tissue and motion artifacts conditions for the case of smallest lesion is presented. Finally, the CAM method, which obtained the best results, was assessed varying SNR/strain values. Simulation results show that CAM outperforms the other methods in displacement estimation across early-stage tumor sizes at both superficial and intermediate depths in all performed tests.