Development of a method for assessing a twinkling artifact for diagnosing urinary stones on various ultrasound scanners

Introduction. Today, ultrasound examination (ultrasound), due to a number of advantages over other diagnostic methods (low cost, lack of ionizing radiation, the ability to perform without restrictions on age, gender, body weight, the presence of metal objects, etc.), is widely implemented in clinical practice. However, the accuracy in detecting urinary stones in the gray-scale mode varies from 33 to 95% and depends on the experience of the specialist performing the study and the quality of the ultrasound apparatus. One of the ways to increase the diagnostic accuracy of the method is to detect the twinkling artifact (TA). However, data on its diagnostic accuracy in detecting urinary tract stones also vary (from 50% to 97%). The reason for this is the methodological features of the conducted scientific research, as well as the technical features of the ultrasound devices used in them, in some of which (devices 2000-2010) the TA is programmatically turned off to improve vascular visualization. In some devices developed in the last decade, the possibility of obtaining AM has been returned. However, there are no methods for detecting TA, optimal settings of the Doppler mapping mode for better visualization. In this regard, experimental work was carried out to develop a methodology for testing the ultrasound device in order to determine the possibility of using AM.