ArticleJournal of endocrinological investigation2021
Testing telediagnostic thyroid ultrasound in Peru: a new horizon in expanding access to imaging in rural and underserved areas.
Article in Journal of endocrinological investigation, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 16 papers.
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Who cites it
16 citing papers in PubMed, 30 citations in OpenAlex.
- An AI-enabled comprehensive breast ultrasound diagnostic system for low-resource settings without a sonographer or a radiologist.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- New lung ultrasound system for rapid triage of pulmonary disease without a radiologist or sonographer.BMC pulmonary medicine · 2025Article
- Is remotely supervised ultrasound (tele-ultrasound) inferior to the traditional service model of ultrasound with an in-person imaging specialist? A systematic review.The ultrasound journal · 2025Article
- Achieving impactful treatment for paediatric endocrine disorders in low- to middle-income countries (LMICs): a scoping review.BMJ open · 2025Article
- WATUNet: a deep neural network for segmentation of volumetric sweep imaging ultrasound.Machine learning: science and technology · 2024Article
- Telemedicine in Peru: origin, implementation, pandemic escalation, and prospects in the new normal.Oxford open digital health · 2024Article
- Paramedic-Performed Prehospital Tele-Ultrasound: A Powerful Technology or an Impractical Endeavor? A Scoping Review.Prehospital and disaster medicine · 2023Article
- Sustainable volume sweep imaging lung teleultrasound in Peru: Public health perspectives from a new frontier in expanding access to imaging.Frontiers in health services · 2023Article
- Enhancing breast ultrasound segmentation through fine-tuning and optimization techniques: Sharp attention UNet.PloS one · 2023Article
- No sonographer, no radiologist: Assessing accuracy of artificial intelligence on breast ultrasound volume sweep imaging scans.PLOS digital health · 2022Article
- Volume sweep imaging lung teleultrasound for detection of COVID-19 in Peru: a multicentre pilot study.BMJ open · 2022Article
- Synchronous tele-ultrasonography is helpful for a naive operator to perform high-quality thyroid ultrasound examinations.Ultrasonography (Seoul, Korea) · 2022Article
- Clinical application of a 5G-based telerobotic ultrasound system for thyroid examination on a rural island: a prospective study.Endocrine · 2022Article
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- Lung ultrasound volume sweep imaging for respiratory illness: a new horizon in expanding imaging access.BMJ open respiratory research · 2021Article
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Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
16 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
purposeThyroid ultrasound is a key tool in the evaluation of the thyroid, but billions of people around the world lack access to ultrasound imaging. In this study, we tested an asynchronous telediagnostic ultrasound system operated by individuals without prior ultrasound training which may be used to effectively evaluate the thyroid and improve access to imaging worldwide.
methodsThe telediagnostic system in this study utilizes volume sweep imaging (VSI), an imaging technique in which the operator scans the target region with simple sweeps of the ultrasound probe based on external body landmarks. Sweeps are recorded and saved as video clips for later interpretation by an expert. Two operators without prior ultrasound experience underwent 8 h of training on the thyroid VSI protocol and the operation of the telemedicine platform. After training, the operators scanned patients at a health center in Lima. Telediagnostic examinations were sent to the United States for remote interpretation. Standard of care thyroid ultrasound was performed by an experienced radiologist at the time of VSI examination to serve as a reference standard.
resultsNovice operators scanned 121 subjects with the thyroid VSI protocol. Of these exams, 88% were rated of excellent image quality showing complete or near complete thyroid visualization. There was 98.3% agreement on thyroid nodule presence between VSI teleultrasound and standard of care ultrasound (Cohen's kappa 0.91, P < 0.0001). VSI measured the thyroid size, on average, within 5 mm compared to standard of care. Readers of VSI were also able to effectively characterize thyroid nodules, and there was no significant difference in measurement of thyroid nodule size (P = 0.74) between VSI and standard of care.
conclusionThyroid VSI telediagnostic ultrasound demonstrated both excellent visualization of the thyroid gland and agreement with standard of care thyroid ultrasound for nodules and thyroid size evaluation. This system could be deployed for evaluation of palpable thyroid abnormalities, nodule follow-up, and epidemiological studies to promote global health and improve the availability of diagnostic imaging in underserved communities.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.