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Breast and pectoral muscle segmentation is an essential pre-processing step for the subsequent processes in computer aided diagnosis (CAD) systems. Estimating the breast and pectoral boundaries is a difficult task especially in mammograms due to artifacts, homogeneity between the pectoral and breast regions, and low contrast along the skin-air boundary. In this paper, a breast boundary and pectoral muscle segmentation method in mammograms is proposed. For breast boundary estimation, we determine the initial breast boundary via thresholding and employ Active Contour Models without edges to search for the actual boundary. A post-processing technique is proposed to correct the overestimated boundary caused by artifacts. The pectoral muscle boundary is estimated using Canny edge detection and a pre-processing technique is proposed to remove noisy edges. Subsequently, we identify five edge features to find the edge that has the highest probability of being the initial pectoral contour and search for the actual boundary via contour growing. The segmentation results for the proposed method are compared with manual segmentations using 322, 208 and 100mammograms from the Mammographic Image Analysis Society (MIAS), INBreast and Breast Cancer Digital Repository (BCDR) databases, respectively. Experimental results show that the breast boundary and pectoral muscle estimation methods achieved dice similarity coefficients of 98.8% and 97.8% (MIAS), 98.9% and 89.6% (INBreast) and 99.2% and 91.9% (BCDR), respectively.

Assistive technology has the potential to enhance the level of independence of people with dementia, thereby increasing the possibility of supporting home-based care. In general, people with dementia are reluctant to change; therefore, it is important that suitable assistive technologies are selected for them. Consequently, the development of predictive models that are able to determine a person's potential to adopt a particular technology is desirable. In this paper, a predictive adoption model for a mobile phone-based video streaming system, developed for people with dementia, is presented. Taking into consideration characteristics related to a person's ability, living arrangements, and preferences, this paper discusses the development of predictive models, which were based on a number of carefully selected data mining algorithms for classification. For each, the learning on different relevant features for technology adoption has been tested, in conjunction with handling the imbalance of available data for output classes. Given our focus on providing predictive tools that could be used and interpreted by healthcare professionals, models with ease-of-use, intuitive understanding, and clear decision making processes are preferred. Predictive models have, therefore, been evaluated on a multi-criterion basis: in terms of their prediction performance, robustness, bias with regard to two types of errors and usability. Overall, the model derived from incorporating a k-Nearest-Neighbour algorithm using seven features was found to be the optimal classifier of assistive technology adoption for people with dementia (prediction accuracy 0.84 ± 0.0242).

This paper presents a method for automatic breast pectoral muscle segmentation in mediolateral oblique mammograms using a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) inspired by the Holistically-nested Edge Detection (HED) network. Most of the existing methods in the literature are based on handcrafted models such as straight-line, curve-based techniques or a combination of both. Unfortunately, such models are insufficient when dealing with complex shape variations of the pectoral muscle boundary and when the boundary is unclear due to overlapping breast tissue. To compensate for these issues, we propose a neural network framework that incorporates multi-scale and multi-level learning, capable of learning complex hierarchical features to resolve spatial ambiguity in estimating the pectoral muscle boundary. For this purpose, we modified the HED network architecture to specifically find 'contour-like' objects in mammograms. The proposed framework produced

This paper presents an extension of work from our previous study by investigating the use of Local Quinary Patterns (LQP) for breast density classification in mammograms on various neighbourhood topologies. The LQP operators are used to capture the texture characteristics of the fibro-glandular disk region (FGD roi ) instead of the whole breast area as the majority of current studies have done. We take a multiresolution and multi-orientation approach, investigate the effects of various neighbourhood topologies and select dominant patterns to maximise texture information. Subsequently, the Support Vector Machine classifier is used to perform the classification, and a stratified ten-fold cross-validation scheme is employed to evaluate the performance of the method. The proposed method produced competitive results up to 86.13% and 82.02% accuracy based on 322 and 206 mammograms taken from the Mammographic Image Analysis Society (MIAS) and InBreast datasets, which is comparable with the state-of-the-art in the literature.

We conclude that modelling user adoption from a range of parameters such as physical, environmental and social perspectives is beneficial in recommending a technology to a particular user based on their profile.

The paper presents quantitative results of a preliminary study undertaken as part of Decision Support and Information Management System for Breast Cancer (DESIREE). DESIREE is a European-funded project to improve the management of primary breast cancer through image-based, guidelinebased, experience-based, and case-based information systems. In this study we explore the use of ensemble deep learning for breast mass classification in mammograms. The proposed method is based on AlexNet with some modifications in order to adapt it to our classification problem. Subsequently, model selection is performed to select the best three results based on the highest validation accuracies during the validation phase. Finally, the prediction is based on the average probability of the models. Experimental evaluation shows that accuracy from individual models ranges between 75% and 77%, but combining the best models (ensemble networks) results in over 80% classification accuracy and aura under the curve.

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