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Seo, Joon Beom

Publications and source records attributed to Seo, Joon Beom.

Development of a Computer-Aided Differential Diagnosis System to Distinguish Between Usual Interstitial Pneumonia and Non-specific Interstitial Pneumonia Using Texture- and Shape-Based Hierarchical Classifiers on HRCT Images

A computer-aided differential diagnosis (CADD) system that distinguishes between usual interstitial pneumonia (UIP) and non-specific interstitial pneumonia (NSIP) using high-resolution computed tomography (HRCT) images was developed, and its results compared against the decision of a radiologist. Six local interstitial lung disease patterns in the images were determined, and 900 typical regions of interest were marked by an experienced radiologist. A support vector machine classifier was used to train and label the regions of interest of the lung parenchyma based on the texture and shape characteristics. Based on the regional classifications of the entire lung using HRCT, the distributions and extents of the six regional patterns were characterized through their CADD features. The disease division index of every area fraction combination and the asymmetric index between the left and right lungs were also evaluated. A second SVM classifier was employed to classify the UIP and NSIP, and features were selected through sequential-forward floating feature selection. For the evaluation, 54 HRCT images of UIP (n = 26) and NSIP (n = 28) patients clinically diagnosed by a pulmonologist were included and evaluated. The classification accuracy was measured based on a fivefold cross-validation with 20 repetitions using random shuffling. For comparison, thoracic radiologists assessed each case using HRCT images without clinical information or diagnosis. The accuracies of the radiologists’ decisions were 75 and 87%. The accuracies of the CADD system using different features ranged from 70 to 81%. Finally, the accuracy of the proposed CADD system after sequential-forward feature selection was 91%.

62 RADIOLOGY AND NUCLEAR MEDICINE↗

An Ensemble Method for Classifying Regional Disease Patterns of Diffuse Interstitial Lung Disease Using HRCT Images from Different Vendors

We propose the use of ensemble classifiers to overcome inter-scanner variations in the differentiation of regional disease patterns in high-resolution computed tomography (HRCT) images of diffuse interstitial lung disease patients obtained from different scanners. A total of 600 rectangular 20 × 20-pixel regions of interest (ROIs) on HRCT images obtained from two different scanners (GE and Siemens) and the whole lung area of 92 HRCT images were classified as one of six regional pulmonary disease patterns by two expert radiologists. Textual and shape features were extracted from each ROI and the whole lung parenchyma. For automatic classification, individual and ensemble classifiers were trained and tested with the ROI dataset. We designed the following three experimental sets: an intra-scanner study in which the training and test sets were from the same scanner, an integrated scanner study in which the data from the two scanners were merged, and an inter-scanner study in which the training and test sets were acquired from different scanners. In the ROI-based classification, the ensemble classifiers showed better (p < 0.001) accuracy (89.73%, SD = 0.43) than the individual classifiers (88.38%, SD = 0.31) in the integrated scanner test. The ensemble classifiers also showed partial improvements in the intra- and inter-scanner tests. In the whole lung classification experiment, the quantification accuracies of the ensemble classifiers with integrated training (49.57%) were higher (p < 0.001) than the individual classifiers (48.19%). Furthermore, the ensemble classifiers also showed better performance in both the intra- and inter-scanner experiments. We concluded that the ensemble classifiers provide better performance when using integrated scanner images.

62 RADIOLOGY AND NUCLEAR MEDICINE↗

Three-dimensional quadratic modeling and quantitative evaluation of the diaphragm on a volumetric CT scan in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

Purpose: In patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), diaphragm function may deteriorate due to reduced muscle fiber length. Quantitative analysis of the morphology of the diaphragm is therefore important. In the authors current study, they propose a diaphragm segmentation method for COPD patients that uses volumetric chest computed tomography (CT) data, and they provide a quantitative analysis of the diaphragmatic dimensions. Methods: Volumetric CT data were obtained from 30 COPD patients and 10 normal control patients using a 16-row multidetector CT scanner (Siemens Sensation 16) with 0.75-mm collimation. Diaphragm segmentation using 3D ray projections on the lower surface of the lungs was performed to identify the draft diaphragmatic lung surface, which was modeled using quadratic 3D surface fitting and robust regression in order to minimize the effects of segmentation error and parameterize diaphragm morphology. This result was visually evaluated by an expert thoracic radiologist. To take into consideration the shape features of the diaphragm, several quantification parameters—including the shape index on the apex (SIA) (which was computed using gradient set to 0), principal curvatures on the apex on the fitted diaphragm surface (CA), the height between the apex and the base plane (H), the diaphragm lengths along the x-, y-, and z-axes (XL, YL, ZL), quadratic-fitted diaphragm lengths on the z-axis (FZL), average curvature (C), and surface area (SA)—were measured using in-house software and compared with the pulmonary function test (PFT) results. Results: The overall accuracy of the combined segmentation method was 97.22% ± 4.44% while the visual accuracy of the models for the segmented diaphragms was 95.28% ± 2.52% (mean ± SD). The quantitative parameters, including SIA, CA, H, XL, YL, ZL, FZL, C, and SA were 0.85 ± 0.05 (mm{sup −1}), 0.01 ± 0.00 (mm{sup −1}), 17.93 ± 10.78 (mm), 129.80 ± 11.66 (mm), 163.19 ± 13.45 (mm), 71.27 ± 17.52 (mm), 61.59 ± 16.98 (mm), 0.01 ± 0.00 (mm{sup −1}), and 34 380.75 ± 6680.06 (mm{sup 2}), respectively. Several parameters were correlated with the PFT parameters. Conclusions: The authors propose an automatic method for quantitatively evaluating the morphological parameters of the diaphragm on volumetric chest CT in COPD patients. By measuring not only the conventional length and surface area but also the shape features of the diaphragm using quadratic 3D surface modeling, the proposed method is especially useful for quantifying diaphragm characteristics. Their method may be useful for assessing morphological diaphragmatic changes in COPD patients.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗

Thoracic cavity segmentation algorithm using multiorgan extraction and surface fitting in volumetric CT

Purpose: To develop and validate a semiautomatic segmentation method for thoracic cavity volumetry and mediastinum fat quantification of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Methods: The thoracic cavity region was separated by segmenting multiorgans, namely, the rib, lung, heart, and diaphragm. To encompass various lung disease-induced variations, the inner thoracic wall and diaphragm were modeled by using a three-dimensional surface-fitting method. To improve the accuracy of the diaphragm surface model, the heart and its surrounding tissue were segmented by a two-stage level set method using a shape prior. To assess the accuracy of the proposed algorithm, the algorithm results of 50 patients were compared to the manual segmentation results of two experts with more than 5 years of experience (these manual results were confirmed by an expert thoracic radiologist). The proposed method was also compared to three state-of-the-art segmentation methods. The metrics used to evaluate segmentation accuracy were volumetric overlap ratio (VOR), false positive ratio on VOR (FPRV), false negative ratio on VOR (FNRV), average symmetric absolute surface distance (ASASD), average symmetric squared surface distance (ASSSD), and maximum symmetric surface distance (MSSD). Results: In terms of thoracic cavity volumetry, the mean ± SD VOR, FPRV, and FNRV of the proposed method were (98.17 ± 0.84)%, (0.49 ± 0.23)%, and (1.34 ± 0.83)%, respectively. The ASASD, ASSSD, and MSSD for the thoracic wall were 0.28 ± 0.12, 1.28 ± 0.53, and 23.91 ± 7.64 mm, respectively. The ASASD, ASSSD, and MSSD for the diaphragm surface were 1.73 ± 0.91, 3.92 ± 1.68, and 27.80 ± 10.63 mm, respectively. The proposed method performed significantly better than the other three methods in terms of VOR, ASASD, and ASSSD. Conclusions: The proposed semiautomatic thoracic cavity segmentation method, which extracts multiple organs (namely, the rib, thoracic wall, diaphragm, and heart), performed with high accuracy and may be useful for clinical purposes.

62 RADIOLOGY AND NUCLEAR MEDICINE↗