In diagnostic ultrasound examinations, transducer “health” is key to diagnostic efficacy. It is known that individual transducer element integrity within an array is central to overall probe performance and over time, with normal use, elements can cease working or lose sensitivity, leading to a potentially negative impact on the clinical efficacy of the ultrasound examination. Investigating this issue, the authors evaluated transducers with selected elements disabled compared to fully functioning arrays, examined how dead elements affected ultrasound beams, acoustic parameters, flow phantom/tissue phantom results as well as human imaging. Results: As few as 2 consecutive dead elements can materially impact the beam profile; four or more can significantly reduce resolution and penetration, increase the noise floor, and cause Doppler peak velocity errors, flow ambiguity and spectral broadening. Tissue phantoms proved to be equivocal in spotting defective elements. Conclusion: array heath is critical to high-quality, efficacious ultrasound studies and the potential for misdiagnosis increases as array elements degrade.

The distribution of insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-1) receptors in the female genital tract was examined by immunohistochemistry. The monoclonal antibody α-IR-3, which binds to the α-subunits of the IGF-1 receptor, was used for specific binding and the peroxidase-antiperoxidase method was used for staining. IGF-1 receptors were consistently detected in the epithelium of cervix, endometrium and the fallopian tube. Furthermore, high expression of the IGF-1 receptors was found in ovarian cancer tissue, where predominantly the stro-mal cells around the vessels gave an intense staining. Since the expression of the 1GF-1 receptors in tumor epithelium was only weak and inconsistent, it is tempting to speculate that the stromal compartment in ovarian cancer is the target tissue for the effects of IGF-1.