1. Evaluating the Efficacy of Cervical Tactile Ultrasound Technique as a Predictive Tool for Spontaneous Preterm Birth.
- Author
-
Egorov V, Rosen T, Hill J, Khandelwal M, Kurtenoks V, Francy B, and Sarvazyan N
- Abstract
Background: Premature cervical softening and shortening may be considered an early mechanical failure that predispose to preterm birth., Purpose: This study aims to explore the applicability of an innovative cervical tactile ultrasound approach for predicting spontaneous preterm birth (sPTB)., Materials and Methods: Eligible participants were women with low-risk singleton pregnancies in their second trimester, enrolled in this prospective observational study. A Cervix Monitor (CM) device was designed with a vaginal probe comprising four tactile sensors and a single ultrasound transducer operating at 5 MHz. The probe enabled the application of controllable pressure to the external cervical surface, facilitating the acquisition of stress-strain data from both anterior and posterior cervical sectors. Gestational age at delivery was recorded and compared against cervical elasticity., Results: CM examination data were analyzed for 127 women at 24
0/7 - 286/7 gestational weeks. sPTB was observed in 6.3% of the cases. The preterm group exhibited a lower average cervical stress-to-strain ratio (elasticity) of 0.70 ± 0.26 kPa/mm compared to the term group's 1.63 ± 0.65 kPa/mm with a p-value of 1.1 × 10-4 . Diagnostic accuracy for predicting spontaneous preterm birth based solely on cervical elasticity data was found to be 95.0% (95% CI, 88.5 - 100.0)., Conclusion: These findings suggest that measuring cervical elasticity with the designed tactile ultrasound probe has the potential to predict spontaneous preterm birth in a cost-effective manner., Competing Interests: Conflicts of Interest V. Egorov is a minor shareholder of Advanced Tactile Imaging, Inc.; he has submitted patent applications related to the described method and device. N. Sarvazyan is a minor shareholder of Advanced Tactile Imaging, Inc. The other authors declare no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this article.- Published
- 2024
- Full Text
- View/download PDF