Classification of Chest X-ray Images using CNN for Medical Decision Support System

Abstract

X-rays are a crucial tool used by healthcare professionals to diagnose a range of medical conditions. However, it is important to keep in mind that a timely and accurate diagnosis is crucial for effective patient management and treatment. While chest X-rays can provide highly precise anatomical data, manual interpretation of the images can be time-consuming and prone to errors, which can lead to delays or incorrect diagnoses. To address these issues, healthcare systems have taken steps to improve diagnostic imaging services following the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. While deep learning-based automated systems for classifying chest X-rays have shown promise, there are still several challenges that need to be addressed before they can be widely used in clinical settings, including the lack of comprehensive and high-quality datasets. To overcome these limitations, a real-time DICOM dataset, has been converted to JPEG format to increase processing speed and improve data control. Three pre-trained models and a convolutional neural network (CNN) model with low complexity and three convolutional layers for feature extraction, along with max pooling layers and ReLU and Softmax activation functions have been implemented. With an validation accuracy of 95.05% on their CNN model using the SGD optimizer, the result has been validated using a separate, real-time unlabeled DICOM dataset of 1000 X-ray images.