Method for segmentation of IVUS image sequences
First Claim
1. A method for performing segmentation of an interior vessel within the body of a patient to detect the inner boundary of said vessel, the method comprising the procedures of:
- obtaining a sequence of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) images of an interior vessel;
tracking images in said sequence to counter various distortions;
performing statistical analysis and spatial integration on said sequence to obtain a classification of blood and tissue regions; and
extracting inner boundary of said interior vessel based on said classification of blood and tissue regions.
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Abstract
Method for performing segmentation of an interior vessel within the body of a patient, the method including obtaining a sequence of intravascular ultrasound images of an interior vessel and dividing the sequence into batches, detecting uninformative regions in each of the batches, the uninformative regions arising from an acoustic shadow cast by guide wire and by calcified plaque within the interior vessel, extracting a preliminary outer boundary of the interior vessel, tracking images in each of the batches to counter various distortions, performing statistical analysis and spatial integration on each of the batches to obtain a classification of blood and tissue regions, extracting a secondary outer boundary of the interior vessel utilizing the classification of blood and tissue regions and refining result, and extracting the inner boundary of the interior vessel based on the classification of blood and tissue regions.
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Citations
58 Claims
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1. A method for performing segmentation of an interior vessel within the body of a patient to detect the inner boundary of said vessel, the method comprising the procedures of:
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obtaining a sequence of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) images of an interior vessel;
tracking images in said sequence to counter various distortions;
performing statistical analysis and spatial integration on said sequence to obtain a classification of blood and tissue regions; and
extracting inner boundary of said interior vessel based on said classification of blood and tissue regions. - View Dependent Claims (2, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51)
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3. A method for performing segmentation of an interior vessel within the body of a patient to detect the outer boundary of said vessel, the method comprising the procedures of:
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obtaining a sequence of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) images of an interior vessel;
extracting an outer boundary of said interior vessel utilizing dynamic programming, wherein images in said sequence of IVUS images are spatially associated with one another. - View Dependent Claims (4, 5, 39, 40, 41, 42)
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6. A method for performing segmentation of an interior vessel within the body of a patient to detect both the inner boundary and the outer boundary of said vessel, the method comprising the procedures of:
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obtaining a sequence of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) images of an interior vessel;
tracking images in said sequence of IVUS images to counter various distortions;
performing statistical analysis and spatial integration on said sequence of IVUS images to obtain a classification of blood and tissue regions;
extracting inner boundary of said interior vessel based on said classification of blood and tissue regions; and
extracting an outer boundary of said interior vessel utilizing dynamic programming. - View Dependent Claims (9, 52, 53, 54)
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55. A method for identifying regions of calcified plaque in an interior vessel within the body of a patient, the method comprising the procedures of:
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obtaining a sequence of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) images of an interior vessel;
applying a morphological closing operation to every image in said sequence of IVUS images;
assigning tentative calcium pixels based on pixel intensity characteristics, resulting in a binary image of true and false pixels;
applying a morphological dilation operation to said resulting binary image; and
determining boundary of calcified plaque regions. - View Dependent Claims (56, 58)
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57. A method for detecting stents in an interior vessel within the body of a patient, the method comprising the procedures of:
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obtaining a sequence of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) images of an interior vessel and dividing said sequence into batches;
applying a morphological closing operation to every image in each of said batches;
partitioning each image into sub-regions and locating pixels with outlying intensities in each of said sub-regions;
assigning tentative stent pixels based on pixel intensity characteristics, resulting in a binary image of true and false pixels;
applying a morphological dilation operation to said resulting binary image;
eliminating falsely identified stent pixels from said binary image;
determining correlation value between consecutive images in each of said batches; and
determining if a stent exists in a batch for each of said batches.
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Specification