Artifacts

Question 1

Refraction?

Answer 1

Caused by the bending of the ultrasound beam when it passes through an interface between two tissues with vastly dissimilar speeds of sound and the angle of the approach is
not perpendicular.

Question 2

Anisotropy ?

Answer 2

Occurs when the sound beam strikes a structure in a nonperpendicular manner, resulting in a loss of the true echogenicity of the structure

Question 3

Answer 3

Anisotropy
( non perpendicular sound beam)

Question 4

Answer 4

Comet tail artifact
( seen with Adenomyomatosis )

Question 5

Answer 5

Edge artifact
seen deep to the margins of a round structure of significantly different speed of sound compared to surrounding tissue
AKA refractive shadowing

Question 6

Answer 6

Mirror image

Produced by a strong specular reflector and results in a copy of the anatomy being placed deeper than the correct location
Ex. Posterior to the diaphragm and liver interface

Question 7

Answer 7

Enhancement / through transmission

Produced when the sound beam is barely attenuated
through a fluid or a fluid-filled structure.

Question 8

What artifact can cause the appearance of two gestational sacs , when there was truly only one present ?

Answer 8

Refraction

Caused by the bending of the ultrasound beam when it passes through an interface between two tissues with vastly different speeds of sound and the angle of the approach is NOT perpendicular

Seen when imaging through the rectus muscles of the abdominal wall

Question 9

Answer 9

Reverberation
Which can be reduced with changing scanning angle
Caused by a large acoustic interface and subsequent production of false echoes
Seen as an echogenic region in the anterior aspect of the gallbladder or other fluid-filled structures

Question 10

Answer 10

Ring down artifact
Produced by air
Seen emanating from gas bubbles within the abdomen
Appears as a solid streak chain of parallel bands radiating away from a structure

Question 11

Shadowing ?

Answer 11

Caused by high attenuation
Seen posterior to bone, and calculi like gallbladder and renal stones

Question 12

Answer 12

Side lobes
Caused by sound beams that are peripheral to the main sound beam
Seen as low-level echoes within fluid, mimicking sludge, debris, or pus within a fluid-filled structure like the gallbladder

Question 13

Answer 13

Slice thickness artifact
Caused by compression of 3D objects into 2D
produces false layering debris within the urinary bladder
(Simulates false echoes that could resemble sludge or debris in the urinary bladder or gallbladder)

Question 14

What Doppler artifact occurs when the Doppler sampling rate is not high enough to display the Doppler shift frequency?

Answer 14

Aliasing

Question 15

Which of the following would be caused by a large acoustic interface and subsequent production of false echoes?

Answer 15

Reverberation

Question 16

Menorrhagia ?

Answer 16

Abnormally heavy menstrual flow

Question 17

On time but light menses AKA ?

Answer 17

Hypomenorrhea

Question 18

Which of the following could be described as an infection of the female genital tract that may involve the ovaries, uterus, and/or the fallopian tubes?

Answer 18

Pelvic inflammatory disease