Medical Image Tag Suppression for Reduced Artefacts
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing medical imaging techniques struggle with the distraction caused by tagged elements, which can obscure structural elements and create bright artefacts, making it difficult to assess the image effectively.
Innovation Solution
A computer-implemented method that generates a suppression image containing tagged elements, which is combined with the original medical image to reduce the apparent brightness of these elements without complete removal, allowing for flexible and sophisticated image processing.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Illumination intensity
If tagged elements are completely suppressed (removed) from the medical image, then the visibility of non-tagged structural elements is improved, but valuable information about tagged elements (such as location of air bubbles or contextual information) is lost
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies partial suppression by reducing the brightness of tagged elements rather than completely removing them. The suppression factor is controlled to be less than 100%, allowing the tagged elements to remain visible but with reduced intensity, thus preserving information while improving visibility of surrounding structures.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies different processing to different regions of the image: tagged elements have their brightness reduced by a suppression factor, while non-tagged elements remain unchanged. This localized differential treatment allows simultaneous optimization of both visibility and information preservation.
2Object-affected harmful factors
If tagged elements are completely suppressed (removed) from the medical image, then bright artefacts are eliminated, but the ability to identify location of air and contextual understanding is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of complete removal which eliminates artefacts but also useful information, the patent uses partial suppression with a controlled suppression factor. This reduces the intensity of bright artefacts to acceptable levels while maintaining the presence of tagged elements for contextual reference.
3Ease of operation
If conventional suppression techniques are used to remove tagged elements, then ease of clinical assessment is improved, but flexibility in image processing is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a dynamic suppression factor that can be adjusted based on clinical needs and image characteristics. This parameter allows flexible control over the degree of suppression, enabling adaptation to different clinical scenarios while maintaining ease of use through automated or semi-automated determination of optimal suppression levels.
Data Source
AI summary
A mechanism for reducing the appearance of tagged elements in a medical image. This is achieved by processing the medical image to generate a separate, suppression image that contains only the tagged elements. The medical image and the suppression image are then combined to reduce the appearance of the tagged elements in the medical image. This can be achieved through modification of the suppressed image, before the combination, and/or weighting of the medical image and the suppression image during combination.