User interface having analysis status indicators

• US 20030095147A1
• Filed: 11/21/2001
• Published: 05/22/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 11/21/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Merative US LP
• Original Assignee: Confirma, Inc. (International Business Machines Corporation)
• Inventors: Daw, Shawni
• Granted Patent: US 7,155,043 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/771
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 33/546 Interface between the MR system and the user, e.g. for controlling the operation of the MR system or for the design of pulse sequences
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 33/56 Image enhancement or correction, e.g. subtraction or averaging techniques , e.g. improvement of signal-to-noise ratio and resolution
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 33/5608 Data processing and visualization specially adapted for MR, e.g. for feature analysis and pattern recognition on the basis of measured MR data, segmentation of measured MR data, edge contour detection on the basis of measured MR data, for enhancing measured MR data in terms of signal-to-noise ratio by means of noise filtering or apodization, for enhancing measured MR data in terms of resolution by means for deblurring, windowing, zero filling, or generation of gray-scaled images, colour-coded images or images displaying vectors instead of pixels image data processing or generation, in general G06T
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 19/20 Editing of 3D images, e.g. changing shapes or colours, aligning objects or positioning parts
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2200/24 involving graphical user interfaces [GUIs]
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2207/30004 Biomedical image processing
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2210/41 Medical
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2219/2012 Colour editing, changing, or manipulating; Use of colour codes
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/0012 Biomedical image inspection
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 128/92 Computer assisted medical diagnostics

Abstract

A memory is provided for storing a plurality of data sets, each data set corresponding to an image of a location within a medical body of interest. Each image contains a number of features which correspond to data points that have been collected when creating an image of the medical body. The data points thus correspond to a measured parameter within the medical body. A visual display is provided of the image having a varying color scale for different regions of interest within the body. Medical personnel are able to select various regions of interest within the image for which further study is desired. In addition, within the region of interest the medical personnel may select a particular feature representing data corresponding to medical information within the body for which further study is desired and have the computer perform an analysis to compare to or locate other tissue of the same type elsewhere in the data sets. When such data analysis are performed on the images, analysis indicators are provided in the upper left hand corner of the display providing an easy to view indication of the results and status of any computer analysis being performed or that has been performed on the data.

Claims

1. A user interface for a medical image comprising:

a memory for storing a plurality of data sets, each data set corresponding to an image of a location within a medical body of interest;

a plurality of data points within each image, each data point corresponding to a measured parameter collected from the medical body of interest;

a visual display having the image thereon, the image being composed of a visual representation of the respective data points for that image;

a color scale variation on the visual display of the image providing a first color scale of those data points in the image that have been analyzed and determined to have a common characteristic; and

an image analysis indicator on the same visual display as the image, the image analysis indicator showing a color scale variation corresponding to the different characteristics of the data;

2. Each data point is composed of information from a plurality of data sets of different types.

3. A user interface for the visual display of an image from an object under study comprising:

a visual display terminal having thereon the image from the object under study;

first markings on the image as presented on the visual display terminal indicating locations on image that correspond to tissues of interest;

second markings on the visual display terminal at a location spaced from the image indicating that the image has first markings thereon.

4. The user interface according to claim 3 wherein the first markings indicate similar regions of material within the object itself that have been identified by a computer analysis of the data collected about the object.

5. The user interface according to claim 4 where in the object is a medical body and similar regions correspond to tissues that have similar characteristics.

6. The user interface according to claim 5 wherein the tissue is a type of cancer.

7. The user interface according to claim 3 wherein the second markings are at a selected location on the visual display terminal to attract the attention of a user.

8. The user interface according to claim 3 wherein the first and second markings are the same color as each other on the visual display terminal.

9. The user interface according to claim 3 further including:

a plurality of images of the object under study displayed simultaneously on the visual display terminal;

second markings present on the visual display terminal associated with each of the plurality of images that have a tissue of interest thereon, indicating whether each respective image has a tissue of interest thereon.

10. The user interface according to claim 9 further including:

first markings on those images within the plurality of images that contain tissues of interest on the image.

11. A user interface for the visual display of an image from an object under study comprising:

a terminal having thereon on plurality of images of the object under study;

tissue of interest identified on at least one of the images under study;

a marking associated with each of the images indicating those images which contain a region that is similar to the tissue of interest, the marking being spaced from the tissue of interest within each respective image.

12. The user interface according to claim 11 wherein the marking associated with each image is spaced from the image.

13. The user interface according to claim 11 wherein the marking associated with each image is at an identical location relative to the image it is associated with for each of the respective images.

14. The user interface according to claim 11 wherein each of the plurality of images is within a window and the marking is at the upper left hand corner of a window that includes the image.

15. The user interface according to claim 11 further including:

a tissue of interest marking on the image indicating the location within the image itself that contains the tissue of interest.

16. The user interface according to claim 15 wherein the tissue of interest has a selected color within each image and the marking has the same color as the tissue of interest.

17. The user interface according to claim 11 wherein the marking has a first form when the tissue of interest indicator is turned on and a second form when the tissue of interest indicator is turned off.

19. The method according to claim 17 wherein each image is within a window on a visual display terminal and the analysis status indicator associated with that image is in the upper left hand corner of that window.

18. A method of indicating images within a set of images that contain a region of interest comprising:

locating in a first image a selected type of tissue within a region of interest;

performing a computer analysis on the image to locate within the image any tissue that is similar to the selected tissue within the region of interest;

performing a computer analysis of a plurality of images to locate within each of the images any tissue that is similar to the selected tissue;

placing an analysis status indicator associated with each image that contains tissue of interest.