Turn direction guidance of an endoscopic device

A computer program product for turn direction guidance of an endoscopic device in a tubular organ, the computer program product comprising:

• one or more computer-readable tangible storage medium and program instructions stored on at least one of the one or more tangible storage medium, the program instructions executable by a processor, the program instructions the program instructions readable by a computing system to cause the computing system to perform a method comprising:
• receiving a current image frame from a camera disposed on the endoscopic device, wherein the current image frame captures a visible lumen of the tubular organ;
• determining an area of the visible lumen in the current image frame;
• determining a ratio of a minimum enclosing circle of the visible lumen to the area of the visible lumen;
• upon determining the ratio breaches a defined threshold, adjusting a target direction of the endoscopic device from a center of the visible lumen towards a center of the current image frame;
• outputting a notification of the adjusted target direction to a controller of the endoscopic device;
• comparing the ratio of the current image frame with a ratio of a previous image frame;
• determining there is a decrease in a size of the area of the visible lumen indicating an approaching turn in the tubular organ;
• upon determining there is a decrease in the size of the area of the visible lumen, outputting a notification of the approaching turn to the controller of the endoscopic device.

A computer system for turn direction guidance of an endoscopic device in real-time in a tubular organ, the computer system comprising:

• one or more computer processors, one or more computer-readable storage media, and program instructions stored on the one or more of the computer-readable storage media for execution by at least one of the one or more processors, wherein the computer system is capable of performing a method comprising:
• receiving a current image frame from a camera disposed on the endoscopic device, wherein the current image frame captures a visible lumen of the tubular organ;
• determining an area of the visible lumen in the current image frame;
• determining a ratio of an area of a minimum enclosing circle of the visible lumen to the area of the visible lumen;
• upon determining the ratio breaches a defined threshold, adjusting a target direction of the endoscopic device in a direction from a center of the visible lumen towards a center of the current image frame;
• outputting a notification of the adjusted target direction to a controller of the endoscopic device comparing the ratio of the current image frame with a ratio of a previous image frame;
• determining there is a decrease in a size of the area of the visible lumen indicating an approaching turn in the tubular organ;
• and
• upon determining there is a decrease in the size of the area of the visible lumen, outputting a notification of the approaching turn to the controller of the endoscopic device.

A computer-implemented method for turn direction guidance of an endoscopic device in real-time in a tubular organ, comprising:

• receiving a current image frame from a camera disposed on the endoscopic device, wherein the current image frame captures a visible lumen of the tubular organ;
• determining an area of the visible lumen in the current image frame;
• determining a ratio of an area of a minimum enclosing circle of the visible lumen to the area of the visible lumen;
• upon determining the ratio breaches a defined threshold, adjusting a target direction of the endoscopic device in a direction from a center of the visible lumen towards a center of the current image frame;
• outputting a notification of the adjusted target direction to a controller of the endoscopic device;
• comparing the ratio of the current image frame with a ratio of a previous image frame;
• determining there is an increase in a size of the area of the visible lumen indicating a moving away from a turn in the tubular organ;
• and
• upon determining there is an increase in the size of the area of the visible lumen, outputting a notification of a the moving away from the turn to the controller of the endoscopic device.