Abstract
BackgroundIn this study, we explored how various preprocessing approaches can be employed to enhance the capability of dental CBCT to accurately estimate trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters.MethodsIn total, 30 bovine vertebrae cancellous bone specimens were used for in study. Voxel resolution 18-μm micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) and 100-μm dental CBCT were used to scan each specimen. Micro-CT images were used to calculate trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters; the results were set as the gold standard. Subsequently, before the dental CBCT images were converted into binary images to calculate trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters, three preprocessing approaches were used to process the dental CBCT images. For Group 1, no preprocessing approach was applied. For Group 2, images were sharpened and despeckable noises were removed. For Group 3, the function of local thresholding was added to Group 2 to form Group 3. For Group 4, the air pixels was removed from Group 3 to form Group 4. Subsequently, all images were imported into a software package to estimate trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters (bone volume fraction (BV/TV), trabecular thickness (TbTh), trabecular number (TbN), and trabecular separation (TbSp)). Finally, a paired t-test and a Pearson correlation test were performed to compare the capability of micro-CT with the capability of dental CBCT for estimating trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters.ResultsRegardless of whether dental CBCT images underwent image preprocessing (Groups 1 to 4), the four trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters measured using dental CBCT images were significantly different from those measured using micro-CT images. However, after three image preprocessing approaches were applied to the dental CBCT images (Group 4), the BV/TV obtained using dental CBCT was highly positively correlated with that obtained using micro-CT (r = 0.87, p < 0.001); the correlation coefficient was greater than that of Group 1 (r = −0.15, p = 0.412), Group 2 (r = 0.16, p = 0.386), and Group 3 (r = 0.47, p = 0.006). After dental CBCT images underwent image preprocessing, the efficacy of using dental CBCT for estimating TbN and TbSp was enhanced.ConclusionsImage preprocessing approaches can be used to enhance the efficacy of using dental CBCT for predicting trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters.
Highlights
In this study, we explored how various preprocessing approaches can be employed to enhance the capability of dental Cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) to accurately estimate trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters
Image preprocessing approaches can be used to enhance the efficacy of using dental CBCT for predicting trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters
By applying image preprocessing approaches, dental CBCT images were analyzed to calculate Bone volume fraction (BV/TV); the BV/TV value decreased from 60.27 ± 9.81% (Group 1) to 44.10 ± 12.55% (Group 4)
Summary
We explored how various preprocessing approaches can be employed to enhance the capability of dental CBCT to accurately estimate trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters. Bone histomorphometry was typically employed to measure trabecular bone microarchitecture. Bone histomorphometry can be used to accurately measure trabecular bone microarchitecture, it can only obtain two-dimensional sections and the testing method is typically considered invasive [5, 6]. Over the past two decades, micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) has been considered a gold standard for assessing trabecular bone microarchitecture [5, 7]. In 2009, Bouxsein et al [7] identified BV/TV, TbTh, TbN, and TbSp as the basic parameters for analyzing trabecular bone microarchitecture. Micro-CT is the gold standard for assessing the trabecular bone microarchitectural parameters, the clinical application of micro-CT is limited because of its narrow scan field and high radiation dose
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