ArticleInfectious diseases of poverty2026
Diagnostic performance comparison of two ultrasound classification systems for hepatic alveolar echinococcosis: a single-center retrospective study.
Article in Infectious diseases of poverty, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
- Alveolar echinococcosis.Current opinion in infectious diseases · 2026Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundHepatic alveolar echinococcosis (HAE) is a severe zoonotic parasitic disease for which ultrasonography is the primary diagnostic tool. However, the heterogeneous imaging characteristics of HAE lesions present significant challenges to accurate diagnosis. To improve diagnostic reliability, this study compared the performance of two established ultrasound classification systems: the Echinococcus multilocularis National Health Commission Classification-Ultrasound (EMNHCC-US) and the E. multilocularis Ulm Classification-Ultrasound (EMUC-US).
resultsThis study compared EMUC-US and EMNHCC-US systems in 169 HAE cases (179 lesions) and 99 non-HAE controls. Both systems identified heterogeneous echotexture as a universal feature but differed in lesion categorization and diagnostic performance. Inter-observer agreement was moderate for EMUC-US (κ = 0.57) and substantial for EMNHCC-US (κ = 0.73). The EMUC-US system included atypical patterns such as metastasis-like, found in 10.6% of cases, and ossified lesions, found in 6.1%. This contributed to its high sensitivity of 96.7% and a negative predictive value (NPV) of 90.3%. The EMNHCC-US system focused on advanced patterns, identifying infiltration in 49.7% of cases and liquefactive necrosis in 31.8%. It demonstrated superior specificity of 94.2% and a positive predictive value of 95.5%. Receiver operating characteristic analysis confirmed a better overall discriminative ability for EMNHCC-US, with an area under curve of 0.88 compared to 0.72 for EMUC-US. Sensitivity analysis revealed that EMUC-US maintained a near-perfect NPV of approximately 100% across all prevalence levels. In contrast, EMNHCC-US offered a higher PPV in high-prevalence settings.
conclusionsThe EMUC-US and EMNHCC-US systems share core features, but EMUC-US includes smaller, atypical lesions (e.g., ossification, metastasis-like), enhancing early HAE detection with higher sensitivity and NPV, ideal for screening. EMNHCC-US focuses on advanced lesions, offering high specificity for confirmation. They are complementary: EMUC-US for sensitive screening, EMNHCC-US for specific diagnosis. Together, they enable a stratified strategy, optimizing case identification and clinical decisions despite lesion heterogeneity.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
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.