[The measurement of gastric emptying time with 3-D ultrasonography].
OBJECTIVE
Three dimensional (3-D) ultrasonography is definitely more accurate than conventional 2-D ultrasonography in volume measurement of intra-abdominal organs. However, its application in measuring gastric emptying time has been limited. Thus, we tried to measure gastric antral emptying time by using 3-D ultrasonography and compare with that by radio-scintigraphy.


METHODS
We performed both 3-D ultrasonography and radio-scintigraphy on the same day in 23 healthy subjects. After overnight fast, the subjects ingested 500 mL of soup meal (84 Kcal) that had been pre-mixed with 1 mCi of technetium(99m). The half emptying time (T(1/2)) measured by 3-D ultrasonography was defined by the time when the gastric antral volume decreased to half.


RESULTS
The mean T(1/2) of 23 healthy subjects measured by 3-D ultrasonography was 23.4 +/- 10.5 min, while that measured by scintigraphy was 28.4 +/- 14.4 min. The difference (p=0.11 by paired t-test) between the two methods was not significant. Moreover, no significant correlation of T1/2 between the two methods (r=0.361, p=0.09) was observed.


CONCLUSIONS
Measuring gastric antral emptying time with 3-D ultrasonography may be useful but require further validation studies and advance in technology.
Department of Internal Medicine, Ewha Womans University College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea. kimdy@ewha.ac.kr
Doe-Young
DY
Kim
Hye-Kyung
HK
Jung
You-Hyun
YH
Lee
Sung-Ae
SA
Jung
Il-Whan
IW
Moon
Jin-Young
JY
Paek
D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D005746:Gastric Emptying; D006801:Humans; D021621:Imaging, Three-Dimensional; D008297:Male; D011877:Radionuclide Imaging; D013270:Stomach / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D013667:Technetium; D014463:Ultrasonography
D013667:Technetium