Characterisation of muscle disease in children

The aim of this study was to extract quantifiable indices characterising the ultrasound propagation and scattering in skeletal muscle, using a real-time linear array scanner in regular diagnostic use in a paediatric muscle clinic. The work attempts to quantify earlier observations, based on conventional imaging, that muscle echogenicity was increased in children with muscle disease, and that this characteristic was diagnostically useful. In this communication the results of scanning boys with Duchenne muscular dystrophy are described. It was found that quantitation of the ultrasound raw echo data was more discriminating than visual assessment of the corresponding image by an experienced observer, and much more discriminating than the assessment of the ´inexperienced´ ´observer. This offers the possibility that early detection of dystrophy could become more common and certain in the hands of the less specialised practitioner, with the (young) patient referred to expert, but few, muscle clinics in the less clear-cut cases only. This has important implications in respect of early counselling to parents about the genetic risk to further sons