Fully Automated Three-Dimensional Detection of Polyps in Fecal-Tagging CT Colonography

Abstract

The presence of opacified materials presents several technical challenges for automated detection of polyps in fecal-tagging computed tomography colonography (ftCTC), such as pseudo-enhancement and the distortion of the density, size, and shape of the observed lesions. We developed a fully automated computer-aided detection (CAD) scheme that addresses these issues in automated detection of polyps in ftCTC. Pseudo-enhancement was minimized by use of an adaptive density correction (ADC) method. The presence of tagging was minimized by use of an adaptive density mapping (ADM) method. We also developed a new method for automated extraction of the colonic wall within air-filled and tagged regions. The ADC and ADM parameters were optimized by use of an anthropomorphic phantom. The CAD scheme was evaluated with 32+32 cases from two types of clinical ftCTC databases. The cases in database I had full cathartic cleansing and 40 polyps > or =6 mm, and the cases in database II had reduced cathartic cleansing and 44 polyps > or =6 mm. The by-polyp detection performance of the CAD scheme was evaluated by use of a leave-one-patient-out method with five features, and the results were compared with those of a conventional CAD scheme by use of free-response receiver operating characteristic curves. The CAD scheme detected 95% and 86% of the polyps > or =6 mm with 3.6 and 4.2 false positives per scan on average in databases I and II, respectively. For polyps > or =10 mm, the detection sensitivity was 94% in database I (with one missed hyperplastic polyp) and 100% in database II at the same false-positive rate. The detection sensitivity of the new CAD scheme was approximately 20% higher than that of the conventional CAD scheme. The results show that the CAD scheme developed in this study resolves the technical challenges introduced by fecal tagging, is applicable to a variety of colon preparation regimens, and provides a performance superior to that of conventional CAD schemes.