US 5,513,273 AGranted

Method for obtaining information about interstitial patterns of the lungs

AssigneeFuji Photo Film Co., Ltd.

InventorWataru Ito

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Abstract

For each picture element in a radiation image of the lungs, a basic Wavelet function is rotated on the radiation image, a degree of contraction of the basic Wavelet function is changed within a predetermined range, and Wavelet transformation is thereby carried out on the image signal, values of a Wavelet transformation factor being thereby calculated. For each value of the degree of contraction, a calculation is made to find a temporary representative value of the values of the Wavelet transformation factor, which have been obtained for each picture element when the degree of contraction was fixed at a predetermined value and the basic Wavelet function was thereby rotated on the radiation image. For each picture element, a representative value is determined from the temporary representative values, which have been calculated for the values of the degree of contraction. Interstitial patterns of the lungs are then rated in accordance with the representative value and the value of the degree of contraction, which was employed in the Wavelet transformation when the representative value was determined.

Claims17

Dependent claims

A method for obtaining information about interstitial patterns of lungs from an image signal comprising picture elements and representing a radiation image of the lungs, said method comprising the steps of:

i) rotating, by a predetermined degree interval, a predetermined basic Wavelet function corresponding to each of said picture elements, and changing a degree of contraction of said basic Wavelet function within a predetermined range to obtain a group of values of a Wavelet transformation factor for each of said picture elements,
ii) calculating a temporary representative value of said group of values of said Wavelet transformation factor obtained for each of said picture elements for a particular degree of contraction of said basic Wavelet function within said predetermined range, said temporary representative value being calculated for each degree of contraction within said predetermined range of said basic Wavelet function,
iii) selecting, for each of said picture elements, a representative value from a plurality of temporary representative values which have been respectively calculated for each degree of contraction of said basic Wavelet function in step ii),
iv) determining, for each of said picture elements, interstitial patterns of the lungs, as normal or abnormal, based upon said representative value and a value of said degree of contraction of said basic Wavelet function employed in the Wavelet transformation when said representative value was determined, and
outputting results of said determining step respectively corresponding to each of said picture elements.

2 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.