Journal of KIISE:Software and Applications (한국정보과학회논문지:소프트웨어및응용)

Korean Institute of Information Scientists and Engineers (한국정보과학회)
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Left Ventricle Segmentation Algorithm through Radial Threshold Determination on Cardiac MRI

심장 자기공명영상에서 방사형 임계치 결정법을 통한 좌심실 분할 알고리즘

  • 문창배 (금오공과대학교 컴퓨터공학부) ;
  • 이해연 (금오공과대학교 컴퓨터공학부) ;
  • 김병만 (금오공과대학교 컴퓨터공학부) ;
  • 신윤식 (금오공과대학교 컴퓨터공학부)
  • Published : 2009.10.15
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Abstract

The advance in medical technology has decreased death rates from diseases such as tubercle, pneumonia, malnutrition, and hepatitis. However, death rates from cardiac diseases are still increasing. To prevent cardiac diseases and quantify cardiac function, magnetic resonance imaging not harmful to the body is used for calculating blood volumes and ejection fraction(EF) on routine clinics. In this paper, automatic left ventricle(LV) segmentation is presented to segment LV and calculate blood volume and EF, which can replace labor intensive and time consuming manual contouring. Radial threshold determination is designed to segment LV and blood volume and EF are calculated. Especially, basal slices which were difficult to segment in previous researches are segmented automatically almost without user intervention. On short axis cardiac MRI of 36 subjects, the presented algorithm is compared with manual contouring and General Electronic MASS software. The results show that the presented algorithm performs in similar to the manual contouring and outperforms the MASS software in accuracy.

의학기술이 발전하면서 결핵, 폐렴, 영양실조, A형간염 등의 질병에 의한 사망률은 감소하는 반면, 심장 질환으로 인한 사망률은 증가하는 추세이다. 심장병을 예방하기 위하여 정기적인 검사가 중요하고, 인체에 무해한 자기공명영상을 활용하여 심장의 혈류량과 심박구출률을 계산하여 심장의 기능을 분석할 필요가 있다. 본 논문에서는 기존의 노동집약적이고 시간적 비용이 큰 수동윤곽분할을 대체하기 위한 자동 좌심실 분할 알고리즘을 제안하였다. 방사형 임계치 결정법을 통하여 심실을 분할하고 혈류량 및 심박구출률을 계산하였으며, 특히 기존 방법들에서 문제가 되었던 기저 영상도 사용자 간섭률을 최소화하여 자동분할을 수행하였다. 제안 알고리즘의 검증을 위하여 36명의 심장 자기공명영상 데이터를 사용하여 전문가에 의한 수동윤곽분할 및 제너럴일렉트로닉스 MASS 소프트웨어와 정량적 비교를 수행하였다. 실험을 통해 제안한 방법이 표준으로 간주되는 수동윤곽분할과 정확도가 유사하며, MASS 소프트웨어보다 높은 정확도를 갖고 있음을 알 수 있었다.

Keywords

References

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