System and method for displaying portions of in-vivo images

• US 10,101,890 B2
• Filed: 05/15/2015
• Issued: 10/16/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 04/28/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Given Imaging Limited (Medtronic Plc)
• Original Assignee: Given Imaging Limited (Medtronic Plc)
• Inventors: Krupnik, Hagai, Horn, Eli, Ecker, Ady
• Primary Examiner(s): Patel, Nirav G
• Application Number:
  US14/713,016
• Publication Number:
  US 20150248223A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,250 Days
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 1/00045 Display arrangement
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 1/0005 combining images e.g. side-by-side, superimposed or tiled
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 1/041 Capsule endoscopes for imaging
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 1/045 Control thereof
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/5838 using colour
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04842 Selection of displayed objects or displayed text elements G06F3/0482 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04845 for image manipulation, e.g. dragging, rotation, expansion or change of colour
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 11/60 Editing figures and text; Combining figures or text
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 3/4038 Image mosaicing, e.g. composing plane images from plane sub-images
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/0012 Biomedical image inspection
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/945 User interactive design; Environments; Toolboxes

Abstract

A method and a system for displaying portions of in vivo images such as pathological or anatomical landmark portions of images, may include receiving a stream of in vivo images captured in a body lumen, and selecting relevant image portions such as suspected pathological image portions from the stream, based on one or more predetermined criteria. A spatial arrangement of the image portions may be determined, and the selected image portions may be resized to an appropriate size, and displayed in a rectangular or hexagonal array layout according to the determined spatial arrangement, such that rows and columns of selected image portions are adjacent to each other.

Claims

1. A method for displaying portions of in vivo images, the method comprising:

receiving a stream of in vivo images captured in a body lumen;

automatically selecting images which correspond to suspected pathology from the stream;

automatically cropping the selected images to remove portions of the selected image which do not comprise the suspected pathology and to obtain image portions of the selected images which comprise the suspected pathology;

wherein the automatic cropping is performed such that the suspected pathology comprises a greater portion of each of the image portions of the selected images than the suspected pathology comprises in each of the selected images; and

displaying the selected image portions arranged spatially in an array.

2. The method of claim 1, comprising determining a number of the image portions to be displayed in the array.

3. The method of claim 1, comprising:

determining similarity between the selected image portions; and

arranging similar image portions in a chronological sequence in the array.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the selected image portions are displayed in the array adjacent to each other, with no spaces, background or borders between adjacent image portions.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the automatic selection is based on one or more selection criteria; and

the one or more selection criteria are either predetermined or based on a user selection.

6. The method of claim 1 comprising selecting the array.

7. The method of claim 1, comprising automatically resizing the selected image portions based on a selected grid arrangement and size of the array.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the automatic cropping is performed such that each of the image portions of the selected images comprises background pixels surrounding the suspected pathology in the image portions.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the automatic cropping is performed based on detected edges of the suspected pathology in the selected images.

10. A system for displaying portions of in vivo images comprising:

a processing unit to;

receive a stream of in vivo images captured in a body lumen;

automatically select images which correspond to suspected pathology from the stream;

and

automatically crop the selected images to remove portions of the selected image which do not comprise the suspected pathology and to obtain image portions of the selected images which comprise the suspected pathology, wherein the automatic cropping is performed such that the suspected pathology comprises a greater portion of each of the image portions of the selected images than the suspected pathology comprises in each of the selected images; and

a display device to display the selected image portions arranged spatially in an array.

11. The system of claim 10 wherein the processing unit is configured to determine a number of the image portions to be displayed in the array.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein the processing unit is configured to:

determine similarity between the selected image portions; and

arrange similar image portions in a chronological sequence in the array.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein the selected image portions are displayed in the array adjacent to each other, with no spaces, background or borders between adjacent image portions.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein:

the automatic selection is based on one or more selection criteria; and

the processing unit is configured to determine one or more selection criteria for the automatic selection based on a user selection, or the one or more selection criteria are predetermined.

15. The system of claim 10 wherein the processing unit is to select the array.

16. The system of claim 10, wherein the processing unit is configured to automatically resize the selected image portions based on a selected grid arrangement and size of the array.

17. The system of claim 10, wherein the automatic cropping is performed such that each of the image portions of the selected images comprises background pixels surrounding the suspected pathology in the image portions.

18. The system of claim 10, wherein the automatic cropping is performed based on detected edges of the suspected pathology in the selected images.