Medical Imaging Volume Rendering for ROI Context
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current medical imaging apparatuses struggle to effectively display a region of interest (ROI) in relation to the entire object, making it difficult for users to quickly identify the relationship between the ROI and the whole object during medical procedures.
Innovation Solution
A medical imaging apparatus and method that sets volume rendering properties differently for a region of interest (ROI) and the remaining region, allowing for the generation and display of a synthesized medical image that visually enhances the ROI within the context of the entire object, using user-defined properties such as transparency, color maps, thresholds, gamma curves, and image filters.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Loss of information
If volume rendering properties are set uniformly for the entire medical image, then the overall image quality is maintained, but the region of interest (ROI) cannot be visually enhanced or distinguished from the remaining region
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies different volume rendering properties to different regions of the medical image. Specifically, first volume rendering properties are applied to the ROI while second volume rendering properties are applied to the remaining region, allowing the ROI to be visually enhanced with properties such as different transparency, color maps, or filtering while the rest of the image maintains its original appearance. This resolves the contradiction by enabling selective enhancement of the ROI without uniformly altering the entire image.
2Loss of information
If the entire medical image is rendered with enhanced properties, then all regions are visually improved, but the processing time and computational resources increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts and processes only the ROI portion of the medical image with enhanced volume rendering properties, while the remaining region is processed separately with different properties. This selective approach reduces the computational burden compared to processing the entire image with enhanced properties, thereby reducing image generation time while still providing detailed visualization where it is most needed - in the ROI.
3Ease of operation
If multiple volume rendering properties are applied to different regions, then the ROI can be clearly distinguished from the remaining region, but the device operation becomes more complex
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the medical image into two distinct regions: the ROI and the remaining region. Each segment is then assigned different volume rendering properties - first properties for the ROI and second properties for the remaining region. This segmentation approach simplifies the user's task of identifying the ROI by providing visual distinction through different rendering properties, while the system automatically manages the complexity of applying multiple property sets to different segments.
Data Source
AI summary
Provided is a medical imaging apparatus. The medical imaging apparatus includes: a user interface configured to receive an input for setting a region of interest (ROI) in a first medical image and an input for setting first volume rendering properties for the ROI and second volume rendering properties for a remaining region of the first medical image other than the ROI; an image generator configured to generate a second medical image by performing volume rendering on the ROI and the remaining region other than the ROI based on the first and second volume rendering properties, respectively; and a display configured to display the second medical image.