A fully automated method for spinal canal detection in computed tomography images

Abstract

This work presents a new automated method for spinal canal detection in Computed Tomography (CT) images. It uses both 2D and 3D information and the algorithm extracts the spinal canal automatically. The procedure can be divided into three main steps. Firstly, a thresholding and a set of morphological operations were applied. Secondly, 3D connectivity analysis was defined to extract the objects forming part of the spinal canal. Finally, the centroid of each slice constituting the spinal canal object was computed. Furthermore, interpolation and extrapolation of data were performed, if required. The method was applied on two different groups, each one coming from different acquisition systems. A total of 25 patients and 8704 images were used. An experienced radiologist evaluated the method qualitatively supporting the utility of it, as all extracted points fell into the spinal canal. Therefore, our method was able to reduce the workload and detect spinal canal objectively. We expect to carry out a quantitative evaluation in our future research. The qualitative outcome of this work suggests promising results.

Automatic segmentation of the spine by means of a probabilistic atlas with a special focus on ribs suppression

“…The location of its centers at all the different heights make a 3D curve that represents the global length and shape of the spine. For this purpose, an algorithm that combines 2D and 3D information was used . Briefly, this algorithm is composed of three main stages and it is based on the fact that the spinal canal is surrounded by cortical bone.…”

“…Firstly, the detection of a seed point is a necessary step to automate the whole process. For this purpose, the same algorithm used for the spinal canal detection in the atlas construction was applied . In this way, the centre points of the spinal canal extracted at each slice were used as seed points to generate the initial contours.…”

“…For this purpose, an algorithm that combines 2D and 3D information was used. 54 Briefly, this algorithm is composed of three main stages and it is based on the fact that the spinal canal is surrounded by cortical bone. Firstly, a thresholding and a set of morphological operations were applied to set a high contrast between spinal canal and cortical bone.…”

“…For this purpose, the same algorithm used for the spinal canal detection in the atlas construction was applied. 54 In this way, the centre points of the spinal canal extracted at each slice were used as seed points to generate the initial contours. Secondly, to improve image quality a processing step was performed.…”

Caracterización Cuantitativa De La Patología Discal Y Lumbar Degenerativa Mediante Análisis De Imagen Por Resonancia Magnética Y Detección Y Segmentación De La Columna Vertebral en Pacientes Oncológicos a Partir Del Análisis De Imagen en Tomografía Computarizada.

“…Sólo los correspondientes al canal vertebral son de nuestro interés. (b) Proceso para extraer únicamente los objetos que constituyen el canal vertebral (la figura (b) ha sido modificada de[172]).…”